


this feeling we found

by screamlet



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Stardust Fusion, Career Ending Injuries, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Happy Ending, M/M, Mental Health Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-16
Updated: 2019-02-16
Packaged: 2019-10-29 17:56:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 53,779
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17812730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/screamlet/pseuds/screamlet
Summary: Tyson stood up and then leaned in so he could whisper to Nate:“I’m gonna drive into the mountains and get you that fallen star, Nate, because I’m gonna marry you. When I come back with that fallen star, you’ll see how in love I am.”*AStardustAU, where Gabe falls and they save each other.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> \+ set during the 2018-19 NHL season  
> \+ title from the supremely catchy [sunrise](https://genius.com/Arty-sunrise-lyrics)  
> \+ you don't need to have watched/read _stardust_ ; consider this Extremely Loosely Inspired By  
> \+ thank you [babygotbackstrom](https://archiveofourown.org/users/babygotbackstrom/) for listening to me talk about this since NOVEMBER

There were lots of reasons to drive out into the mountains. First: mountains were great. They were beautiful, huge, imposing, and surrounded by the best parts of nature, like majestic trees and cute animals and cold lakes carved out by ancient glaciers. All that shit looked amazing on insta.

Secondly, Tyson lived just outside Denver so the mountains were like, right fucking there. Really, it was a shame he didn’t leave the city more often to go look at some mountains. There was a whole range of these mountains practically right in his backyard. They were supposed to be amazing. The team once took an outing where they rode horses on a trail near a mountain and it was pretty cool. Sure, he could have done that on his own whenever he wanted, or gotten a bunch of the guys together to go camping, or taken himself on a hike, but driving out into the mountains tonight was a start. 

He wasn’t driving for any of those reasons, but. Whatever. 

*

“Tys, please,” Nate said. “Please, you’re—you’re my best friend. Please don’t ask me.”

“I’m not _asking_ you anything,” Tyson said. “I’m just sitting here, in my big backyard that’s perfect for the nine dogs you want some day, with my fancy patio lighting set to _romance_ , and I’m—I’m not asking anything. I’m _proposing_ that, maybe—”

“I know you are,” Nate said. “And I’m begging you, please. Please don’t do this. You don’t _want_ this.”

“All this?” Tyson sputtered and he motioned to the picnic dinner around them that he had set up on a darling checkered blanket. “I made you a ham! Okay, I got you a ham that someone else made and it’s delicious, and I got _champagne_ because it’s a normal night like any other! This is who we are! #BestFriends! And I’m just saying— _proposing_ —that maybe we—”

Tyson stopped because Nate was staring at him. Hand over his mouth, straight up _staring_ at Tyson like he wanted to run. Run from what? From _Tyson_?

“You’re my best friend,” Nate said softly, almost through his fingers. “#BestFriends, forever. And you—Tys, you’re never gonna lose me. Never, I promise.”

Tyson stared at him, then nodded. They stared at each other for another moment, then broke eye contact in time to see a shooting star rushing across the sky just over their heads, disappearing somewhere north of them. 

“I’ll do anything for you, okay?” Nate said. “Are you listening? I’ll do _anything_ for you. Just… not this.” They were both quiet until Nate repeated himself. “Okay, buddy?”

“Yeah,” Tyson said. He cleared his throat, turned his face away from Nate to swipe discreetly at his eyes, then turned back to Nate with a big smile. “Yeah, I’m great. I’m sorry I—” Tyson motioned at the dumb, embarrassing picnic between them, all that fancy ham sitting out and probably on the verge of giving them both food poisoning if they didn’t get it inside soon. “Hey, listen, I’m gonna go for a little drive, okay? Can you take everything back inside?”

“Where are you going?” Nate asked.

“Just for a drive.”

“Okay, well, help me put all this back in your fridge and I’ll come with you.”

“No, it’s okay, I just—”

“I know your freezer better than mine, dude, I know you’re not leaving for fucking dessert.”

Tyson stood up, brushed off his pants, and then leaned down so he could whisper near Nate’s ear:

“I’m gonna drive into the mountains and get you that fallen star, Nate, because I’m gonna marry you. When I come back with that fallen star, you’ll see how in love I am.”

Tyson walked away towards his car while Nate called out behind him, “Fine, don’t fucking tell me! Just bring back some beer! I hate champagne, man! This is exactly why we can’t get married!”

*

As Tyson drove further away from the city and deeper into the forest towards the mountains, he remembered a PR outing with the team where they ended up at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science. It had been a fun day, chasing each other around like the idiots they were and _ooh_ ing and _aah_ ing at the skeletons and stuff, but the only actual science Tyson picked up that day was from a really cute geologist on staff. His hair was a mess and his teeth were real and gleaming as he led Tyson into the dark and winding Gems and Minerals exhibit. 

“So it’s a meteorite when it’s fallen from space,” Tyson had said, staring at Geologist Nick’s lips, his tongue darting out as they drifted closer to each other in front of the glass case built into the walls. “And a meteor when it’s like, still… in the sky, or in space, or whatever.”

“The meteor is the light in the sky, the path of the falling star itself,” said Geologist Nick. 

“That’s romantic as hell, Geologist Nick,” Tyson said. “What else do you wanna tell me?”

_No_ , Tyson scolded himself as he drove. He was in love with _Nate_. He was driving into the mountains to find a meteorite for _Nate_ and it was going to be romantic as fucking hell. He wasn’t even a little bit out of his mind: meteorites were real! The light that flashed across the sky was incredibly bright, and Tyson’s stupid hockey brain could definitely put two and two together: incredibly BIG light probably meant incredibly BIG meteorite. Even if it was the size of a minivan or something, like the one in the Gems and Minerals exhibit where he had panted in Geologist Nick’s ear and begged for his number, Tyson could chip off a piece of rock big enough to put on a ring or a pendant and present it to his best friend and future husband. 

The minivan theory was starting to become a little less of a joke and a little more of a reality, Tyson realized. He was definitely headed in the right direction because the tops of the trees in front of him had been cleared in a direct slash, like something massive and on fire had blown through there recently. He drove until he reached a parking lot near a campsite and ranger station; the destruction was still in the trees over his head, but the path towards the impact site of whatever fell was definitely nearby, Tyson was sure of it. His car had flown here fueled by true love and a fiery intensity to give his life some sort of direction and meaning, so he had beat the rural space-watching weirdos here and it was absolute fucking _fate_ that Nate would marry him wearing a ring made out of their own personal blessed-by-true-love meteorite. Everything was coming up Tyson.

*

An hour’s walk later, everything was still coming up Tyson, just a lot slower and creepier than he expected. For one: damn, the woods were _dark_. Like, this was why he didn’t live out here, with the total lack of streetlights and civilization and shit. His iPhone had done a valiant job of lighting the way for him, but then he turned the light off because every gross bug in the forest wanted to fuck the source of the bright light in his hand. Also, nothing said PLEASE MURDER ME like alerting all the serial killers in a five-mile radius that there was someone stupid and vulnerable wandering through their turf, just waiting to fall into their giant crater of bones. Walking off the trail, illuminated only by the moonlight breaking through the trees above him, in shoes one million percent not intended for anything rougher than a parking lot, with a knee that was starting to nag at him—all that had considerably slowed his progress, but it was okay. There was a light up ahead and Tyson knew that it was either his fallen star, or a 7/11 had set up shop in the middle of nowhere and decided to emit a soft glow that called to Tyson like nothing else had before. 

No, not true. Sometimes a sheet of ice could glow like that. When Tyson couldn’t sleep—

Lately, Tyson couldn’t sleep. He would give up at around four or five, dress for the day, grab his stuff, and end up at the practice rink. The security staff on the night shift were used to him, and the ice crew didn’t have to take care of the ice until closer to practice, so on any given morning he had plenty of time to himself. 

Back in the day, management would scold him constantly about what a liability it was for him to rush around skating unsupervised, sleep-deprived, doing whatever he wanted. Now that Tyson would never play again, all that was less of a concern. 

As suddenly as Tyson had entered the thick of the woods, he emerged from it and found himself at the edge of a massive crater, still smoking new. At least, he assumed all these things were related (the falling star, the sudden gap in the forest, the crater, the smoke from where something had obliterated all that earth), because if this was some sort of secret hot spring/sauna or whatever, he _definitely_ would have heard about it before and maybe even considered venturing out here for some cruising and relaxation. 

The earth here sparkled with something, the dirt glittering in the light of whatever was at the center of the crater. Tyson squinted, both because of the center of the crater was super bright and because it was hard to see if there were any suitable meteorite chunks here at the rim of the crater. See, if he found something _here_ , it would still be a piece of meteorite for Nate’s engagement ring and wedding present and fucking _trousseau_ if he wanted. If he didn’t find anything up here, he would have to walk in his unreasonable shoes into the center of the crater, where the unearthly glow of something was becoming an extremely real inevitability for Tyson.

“Oh, fuck it,” Tyson muttered under his breath as he stumbled into the crater. If it was an alien, maybe they were a hot member of the intergalactic Peace Corps and they would take him away to some awesome paradise planet and Tyson could be some kind of ambassador or husband-prince to the new scorching hot and glowing love of his life; if it was a radioactive piece of rock ready to kill him instantly, at least his busted knee wouldn’t be the worst thing wrong with his body anymore. Really, Tyson’s life could only go up from here. 

In the forever and a day it took Tyson to make some progress into the crater, his eyes began to adjust to the glow at the source of the crater. Or maybe the glow was fading—oh god, was Tyson’s presence killing whatever was there? Could he have literally one moment in his entire life where he wasn’t complete and utter poison to everything and everyone around him?

“Hey!” Tyson called out, rather than risk hurting who/whatever glowed at the center of the crater. “Uh, you okay in there?”

The glow dimmed a little more. Just as Tyson saw a figure sprawled out (two legs, two arms, a head, presumably a torso under those ethereal white silk clothes?), a voice called back:

“No.”

“Oh. Okay. Wait, no? Do you want help?”

“No.”

“Uhhhhhhh.”

“I’ll manage.”

“You sure? You’ve—I don’t know how long you’ve been down there, but like, if you haven’t moved yet—”

A groan came out of the person at the center of the crater. Tyson hustled so he could get closer, crossing the rest of the distance in no time once he stopped thinking about his ruined shoes and how _gross_ being in the woods felt. As he approached, another groan came out of the figure and, helpfully, more words.

“Ugh, what are you doing? I said I’ll manage!”

“I mean, you did, but then you groaned like you were in pain so—”

“I _am_ in pain, but I _groaned_ in exasperation.” 

Tyson stopped short because he had reached the person and, just his fucking luck, it turned out that the person in the crater was one hundred percent a _Star Trek_ human-looking kind of alien and also the most handsome, the most beautiful, the most bitch-faced dude he had ever seen in his _life_. 

And he was looking at Tyson. 

And he was annoyed. 

_And_ he was so fucking hot while he was so annoyed, oh _god_ , this was how the world ended! Aliens had set a literal thirst trap for Tyson Barrie, who would gladly hand over any and all nuclear codes for the chance to suck his glowing dick. Goodbye, Denver! It never stood a chance against Tyson’s blazing sluttiness. 

“I don’t know how long I’ve been here,” he continued. His eyes were fixed on some point up past Tyson, so Tyson looked up. Over their heads was a wide clearing in the trees and past that, a dark sky with an infinite spread of stars. It took Tyson’s breath away until he looked down at the man in the crater again, who could have his fucking lungs at this point for all Tyson “needed” breathing. 

“Left your watch in your ship, huh?” Tyson asked. “Assuming, you know. You were in a ship.”

“A ship?”

“You know, the uh. Thing you came from?”

The guy lying in a heap at the center of the crater was definitely the source of the glow that had led Tyson here. That glow was beginning to fade and, judging from how close Tyson was now, it probably had nothing to do with Tyson. As the glow faded, his features became clearer, clear enough that Tyson could see the way he furrowed his eyebrows, quirked his mouth like he was considering something, and finally opened his gorgeous mouth to speak. 

“You mean, _space_?”

“Well—yeah? You had to travel through space—”

“Go on, tell me how I got here, I would love to hear it.”

“—And because you’re still like, a talking and breathing bag of bones and muscle and stuff, I’m _guessing_ you had to be in some kind of ship to get here.”

“Or a rogue comet smashed into me and knocked me down here and I flew here really, _really_ fast. Shipless,” he said. “I’m not _from_ anywhere, except up there.”

Tyson nodded thoughtfully, sort of processing the words but not really. 

“I was trying to tell how long it had been since I had fallen but that view won’t help,” he said. 

“Oh! It’s been like three or four hours,” Tyson said. “That was when I left Nate at my place and—oh shit.”

“Sure, all of that made sense. Three hours since you left Nate. Now the world can begin to turn.”

“Speaking of which,” Tyson said. “Have you seen a meteorite around here? The star that fell? Or was that—”

“Oh, wow,” the guy said after Tyson’s moment of slack-jawed silence. “I can see the pieces slotting together in your head, right on your face. That’s wonderful.”

Tyson made a face. “Come on, man. Do you think this happens to me every day?”

“You were here pretty quickly, _man_ , I don’t know what your life is like that you ended up as my welcoming committee to…”

“Colorado. We’re in a national park, I think, but I’m driving you back to Denver.”

“You’re not driving me anywhere.”

“Uh, where the fuck do you think you’re going on foot? You’re in the _forest_ , there’s nothing but trees and murderous hitchhikers out here.”

“And you’re not one of them?” the guy asked. “Tree or murderer?”

“Yeah, I’m pretty confident I’m neither of those things!” Tyson said. “Come on, I’ll drive you back to Denver and we can figure something out.”

Tyson extended his hand and the guy, after a moment’s hesitation, finally clasped Tyson’s hand and tried to hoist himself up. It would have worked, too, if the guy didn’t scream in agony and immediately fall back down flat on his back and pull Tyson down with him. Tyson fell square on his chest and they knocked the the wind out of each other. Tyson’s knee, the fucked up one that ruined his life, also screamed in agony, but quieter than the guy’s broken leg. Tyson was used to it. 

“How do you _weigh_ so much, you’re just bones and meat,” he groaned. 

“I play hockey, dumbass,” Tyson said. “And your leg is super fucking broken.”

“No shit, I noticed.”

“Come on, I’ll help you up.”

“That worked out so great thirty seconds ago.”

“Before I knew your leg was broken!” Tyson scoffed. “I can bench you. Let me help you up.”

“Just bring your car to the crater and I’ll crawl to you like a snake!”

“Snakes don’t crawl!”

“I can’t slither!”

Tyson rolled his eyes and arranged his new best friend to his liking: sitting up, one arm firmly around Tyson’s shoulders, Tyson’s arm firmly around the guy’s trunk. “Weight on your good leg, okay?” Tyson said, to the guy and to himself. “One, two, three.”

It wasn’t attractive in the slightest, but Tyson got them there despite his own body’s furious complaining that he couldn’t bear this kind of weight anymore, no matter how hot this guy was, _idiot_. 

To Tyson’s chagrin, star guy had several inches on him and, yeah, he _absolutely_ noticed. 

“What a cute little smile you have from here,” the guy said. 

“I’ll forgive that comment because you’re new to this planet, you have a broken leg, and it’ll take a long time for you to learn short jokes are like, the cheapest humor there is,” Tyson said. 

“It wasn’t a joke,” the guy said. “You have a nice smile. It must be what stopped your parents from eating their young.” 

“Nate’s gonna _love_ you,” Tyson sighed. “My car’s too far to carry you the entire way, so you’re gonna have to help me out a little and use that one good leg.”

He sighed heavily, like he wasn’t literally putting all his weight on Tyson’s shoulders as they walked out of the crater. 

*

In their long walk out of the crater and through the woods back to Tyson’s car, the star offered some information about himself: his name was Gabriel and no, he was not featured in any popular mythological works on this planet. He was one of about three thousand stars in an open cluster in this arm of the galaxy. Gabe called these other stars in the cluster his _siblings_ ; Tyson shared that he only had one sister, Victoria. 

“And who’s Nate?” Gabe asked. The orange service lights from the lot where Tyson had parked his car were calling to him. Gabe was doing his best to keep up, but between having inhabited a human body for all of a few hours and walking on a broken leg, they were taking breaks pretty often. 

“Nate?”

“You mentioned him about a dozen times back in the crater. You said Nate would love me.”

Tyson choked on air and stumbled. Gabe stumbled with him, but grabbed onto the closest tree and threw his weight against it.

“What happened? Are you dying?”

“What?” Tyson asked. “No, I’m coughing, I—you took me by surprise.”

“How long do humans live?” Gabe demanded. “Is this your time? I thought you had at least another hundred years before I would have to dispose of you.”

“Holy shit, _what_?” Tyson asked. “No, I’m coughing! I’m like, twenty-seven! I’ve got some time! Are you going to kill me?! You just landed here! What the fuck!”

Tyson leaned against another tree, throwing his head back so he could catch his breath. He took several deep breaths of the fresh beautiful forest air that was starting to make him real fucking sick and tired, then looked through his lashes at Gabe. 

Gabe was watching him intently, thoughtful and maybe almost interested in whatever he saw—not like, sex interested, but _what a curious little bug_ interested, like he wasn’t quite sure how Tyson worked but he was very sure Tyson was going to collapse and fade into dust at any moment. Tyson closed his eyes for another moment, took a few more breaths, then cleared his throat.

“Okay, ready to keep going?” he asked. “My car’s in this lot. Just a little further and then no more walking.”

“Forever? You promise?” Gabe asked.

Tyson frowned. “No, I’m sorry, the walking’s a feature, not a bug. But no walking for a while, until we get back to the city. I’m gonna take you to a hospital so we can take care of your leg.”

“Take care of it?”

“Yeah. Look at it, probably x-ray it, set it, get you some crutches or a cane—”

“That sounds… like a lot.”

“It is a lot! Maybe it’s not broken. Maybe you just, uh.”

“What about a wooden leg? Could I get one of those?”

“Uhhhhhhh we usually try and fix the ones you’ve got first. And hey, maybe you’ve got like, some star magic or something and it’ll heal super fast.”

Gabe nodded. “I’ve never tried that before. Then again, I’ve never had a body full of flimsy little bones before. Should I tell the leg person that I have magic and I should—”

“I mean, do you have magic?” Tyson asked. “Asking for you and your leg, of course, not for any permanently injured athletes I know or anything.”

Tyson’s car was finally in sight and his knee decided to celebrate with burning, searing pain. Tyson had to pause and take a breath, leaning a little too much on Gabe. 

“Come on, Tyson,” Gabe said. “Just a little further and we can both fall onto your car.”

“That’s like, the first nice, encouraging thing you’ve said to me since we met,” Tyson said. “Congratulations.”

“I said you had a nice smile,” Gabe said. “I assume it’s a nice smile. It’s the first one I’ve ever seen.”

“What? No way. You know English and probably like, every other language ever, after creeping on us from your cluster all this time. This isn’t the first time you’ve seen a _smile_.”

Gabe made a noise. “No, but—it was the first one that was mine.” 

Tyson didn’t know how to react to that in the slightest, but fortunately he didn’t have to; by some miracle, they had finally reached Tyson’s car. Both of them threw their exhausted bodies against the car like they had never seen anything better in the entire universe, and the next several minutes were reduced to haggard breathing and short little laughs of disbelief, like they actually weren’t going to make it until they just did. 

Then again, Tyson had maybe scared away his best friend in the world with a completely insane marriage proposal, driven to the woods to find a meteorite, found a super hot guy instead, set back his rehab maybe a million years by walking in shitty fashionable shoes on shitty terrain for way too far and way too long, and _Gabe_ was an immortal ball of gas that had been knocked down to Earth and made human and the impact immediately snapped his leg like a twig. They were having some fucking night. 

Tyson shook his head and pulled out his keys to unlock the door and make his way over to the driver’s side. “Just pull the handle, like, lift it and pull it, and you can get inside.”

Watching Gabe hop to maneuver himself around to do that was unfortunately sort of adorable, mostly because of how Gabe bit his lip in concentration and tried not to scream every time he put weight on his bad leg. Gabe eventually plopped into the car, pulled his other leg inside, and shut the door. 

“So this is a car,” Gabe eventually.

“Everything you dreamed it would be?”

“I don’t know.”

Tyson turned on the radio and Gabe’s eyes lit up. 

“My leg doesn’t hurt anymore,” Gabe said.

“Oh, boy, don’t you worry, there’s plenty more ABBA where that came from,” Tyson laughed. “Wait until you see _Mamma Mia_.”

“Tell me everything about this,” Gabe said, with an otherworldly intensity towards Tyson that was the second or third thing that really convinced him Gabe wasn’t bullshitting him and had actually fallen from space and crashed into earth earlier this evening. 

“Uh, here’s my phone,” Tyson said as he handed it over to Gabe. “Just yell at it, SIRI TELL ME ABOUT ABBA.”

“One more time: who’s Nate?” Gabe asked. “His name is all over this screen.”

Tyson took back the phone and swiped the messages open. “God,” Tyson sighed. “Hold on.”

He took a deep breath, as deep as he could at this altitude, and called Nate, who answered immediately. 

“Is that you? Please be okay.”

“I’m fine, Nate.”

“I’ll marry you, okay?!”

“Wait, what?”

“Tys, I’ll—look, I’ll do whatever you want. I know things really fucking suck right now, _I know that_ , and—you’re my best friend, Brutes.” Tyson covered his mouth because, fuck, Nate was on the fucking phone and he was fucking crying. He was crying and Tyson had _made him cry_. He was officially a war criminal in Canada, he had _made Nathan Mackinnon cry_. 

“Nate, I’m sorry, okay, I didn’t mean—”

“No, you listen!” Nate said. “You’re my best friend, Tyson Barrie, and I told you I’d do anything for you and I meant it. So if that’s what you need—you need a license and tax breaks and fancy tuxes and flowers to tell everyone that I love you and I’m never gonna leave you and you’re gonna be just fine after all this, then I’ll do it, okay? I’ll do it for as long as you need me. Just come back, all right? Please. Please come back.”

“Nate,” Tyson sighed. “God, I don’t deserve you.”

“I don’t care, bitch, because you’ve got me,” Nate said. “Now and forever. Now get the fuck back here or—and hey, now that I’m your fiancé, turn on your find my friends feature so I can make sure you’re coming home!” 

“Nate,” Tyson said. “It’s gonna be a while before I’m back, okay? And you don’t have to marry me.”

“What do you mean _a while_? Where are you? Where did you go?”

“I’ll tell you later, okay? I’m coming back tonight, though, I promise.”

“You’re scaring me, Tyson.”

“Trust me, please.”

Nate was quiet on the other side, then sighed. “I trust you. I’ll be at your place, so don’t get freaked out or anything when I’m sleeping in your bed because your couch sucks. Just come back, okay?”

“I’ll come back, I promise.”

“We love you, Tyson, all right? _I_ love you. You’re my best friend. People care about you.”

“I know. I’ll see you soon.”

Tyson hung up and held the phone against his leg. He had no idea who he was, what his night had been, or what was going on until he looked out of the corner of his eye and saw Gabe there. He jumped, actually jumped in his seat, remembering that he was there and _that_ was what his night had been: a hideous embarrassment of a proposal that was obviously a last ditch effort to make himself relevant to his best friend’s life, and driving into the woods to pick up a stranger in a literal hole. 

“What happened?” Gabe asked. 

“It’s a long story,” Tyson said. “Let’s get you to the hospital and fix up your leg.” Tyson pressed something on the dashboard and ABBA came roaring back to life. “Good music, huh?”

“Tyson, who’s Nate?”

Tyson slipped his phone into the cupholder and started up the car. “He’s my best friend,” Tyson finally said. “I drove into the woods tonight because I thought a falling star was a big piece of rock, and I could take a piece of that rock and make it into a ring Nate would like. Nate’s my best friend, though, and he just told me that he doesn’t want anything for being my friend. I think I knew that all the time, but I needed to hear it again and hear it from him.”

“Oh,” Gabe said. “And now that I’m a person?”

“Well, I’m not a fucking monster,” Tyson said sharply. “So now that you’re a person, I’m gonna take you to the hospital and have someone set your leg. Then I’ll take you to my house and you’ll stay there as long as you want, because you’re not a star anymore. You’re a person here on Earth and you’ve got no one and nowhere and nothing to be, and that makes two of us.” 

They sat there in silence for one very, very long moment. Tyson suddenly felt a hand on his arm, then on his shoulder, a cold hand that was so gentle and so tentative in its touch that Tyson thought he was almost imagining it. He glanced at Gabe’s hand from the corner of his eye, then glanced at Gabe, whose eyes were fixated on his touch. His eyes then focused on Tyson, full of some kind of wonder like he had never touched anyone before (untrue, they had grunted and hobbled their way together through the woods to the car).

“I’m sorry,” Gabe said softly. 

The fight suddenly went out of Tyson—not that he wanted to fight Gabe, or Nate, or anyone. But he wanted to fight himself, and his fucked up leg, and his hopeless future, and suddenly that went out of him as he stared at Gabe, his unearthly clear blue eyes, the way he wanted Tyson to feel something besides hurt and anger. 

“Me too,” Tyson said. “Are you hungry?”

Gabe lowered his hand, pulled it away from Tyson, resting both his hands in his lap like he wasn’t sure what hands did now. “I don’t know if I am.”

“I can eat,” Tyson decided, then tore out of the parking lot and onto the highway.

*

Two hours later, Tyson and Gabe were sitting in a curtained-off section of the emergency department in a Boulder hospital with what could be described as a dumpster’s worth of Wendy’s, the best Tyson could do given that almost nothing in Colorado was open past 9pm.

“Are you stacking the crispy chicken between the two burgers?” Tyson laughed, his mouth full of nuggets.

“Remember when you asked if I was hungry?” Gabe asked. “I’m hungry. I’m hungry forever. I’ve been hungry since the beginning of time.”

“Haha, okay,” Tyson said. “Do you have more honey mustard?”

“No,” Gabe said sadly. “I only have ranch. I don’t like ranch.”

“It grows on you,” Tyson said. “Give it another ten nuggets or so.”

“No, I’ve had several packets of ranch and I don’t like it and I never will,” Gabe said.

The doctor came in, stared at their spread of junk food, then looked at Tyson. “Hypertension?”

“It was the only thing open,” Tyson explained to her. “Doc, he’s been hungry since the beginning of time.”

“Broken leg,” the doctor said, glancing down at the chart. “Mr… Barrie?” The doctor looked at Gabe, then at Tyson with her eyebrows raised.

“That’s Tyson,” Tyson said, pointing to Gabe.

“Yes,” Gabe said with a mouth full of chicken. “I’m Tyson and I have insurance. Heal me.”

The doctor nodded, then looked at Tyson again. “Did you notice the billboard right before the exit here, the one with your face on it?”

“Ugh, that’s still up? No, I missed it, we came from the north side,” Tyson said. “Look. His leg’s broken.”

“Sure,” said the doctor. “I was looking to commit insurance fraud today. Just gimme a sec to look up fines and prison sentences.”

“Fine, okay? Just bill me,” Tyson snapped. “And help him, please? I’m serious about the leg. He’s already put too much weight on it just to get here.”

“And what’s not-Tyson’s name?” the doctor asked, scratching something out on her clipboard.

“Gabriel,” Gabe said clearly.

“Last name?” the doctor asked.

“Barrie,” Gabe said firmly.

Tyson choked on whatever he was eating. The doctor clicked her pen shut and looked again at Tyson, then clapped him firmly on the back. 

“Does that help?” Gabe asked, watching Tyson continue to cough as the doctor tried to slap the spine out of him.

“Help him? Probably not,” the doctor said. “But it makes me feel better.”

Tyson sipped some Frosty through the straw and glared at the doctor, who waited expectantly for an answer.

“... My secret husband?” Tyson suggested. 

“This league is a disaster,” sighed the doctor as she clicked her pen again. “All right, so I’m going to order some X-rays to see how broken this bone is, then we’ll get to work on setting it. I assume he’s coming home with you, Mr. Barrie, so all the caretaker information should come to you?”

Tyson nodded, then looked to Gabe. “Don’t worry about it, okay? A bone’s about the easiest thing to fix. Bones heal, you know? We do everything she says, you’ll be good as new in like, two months.”

“How many hours is that?” Gabe asked patiently. “I’m not sure of the conversion rate, but I know months is longer.”

“What?” asked the doctor.

“Didn't you say something about X-rays?” Tyson asked.

“I sure did,” said the doctor, who breezed out of there like she didn’t want any more information than was absolutely necessary. Tyson was more than happy to oblige her.

*

Another while later, they were back in the car driving to Tyson’s house. Gabe’s new pair of crutches were lying in the back seat while Gabe had pushed the passenger seat back, the better to give his leg some space and allow himself to clutch his bag of Wendy’s leftovers. 

“Will you store my food bag in your house for later when I’m hungry again?” Gabe asked. “I think I’m going to be hungry forever.”

Tyson glanced over and out slipped from his mouth, “Oh, _honey_.” Tyson cleared his throat before he spoke again. “Yeah, I will. And don’t worry, we’re gonna eat a lot of things.”

“Okay. My leg hurts again.”

“Yeah, it’s gonna hurt.”

“I’m going to try star magic when we’re at your house. Maybe it’ll work. Maybe I have that.”

“You do that, but in the meantime remember what the doctor said, okay? You’ve gotta leave the whole damn leg alone to heal itself.” 

“You know, comets crash into stars all the time,” Gabe said softly. “Matilda, the largest star in our cluster, she would get comets all the time. It would be like—like something tearing into the surface of a star, but she’s a big star, and no rock stood a chance. They would either orbit her for a time and then leave again, or they would melt into her. You could see the surface split apart then heal again. That sounds like what the doctor said bones do.”

“Kinda like that. Yeah. She set the bone so the ends can reach out and bring themselves back together. You let it do its work and you’ll be okay.”

“I don’t know why I’m here,” Gabe said. “Why did the comet knock me here? I wasn’t a little thing, I—”

“It doesn’t help,” Tyson said. “Trying to figure out why anything happens. Things just do. Then you say, _okay, that happened_ , and you pick yourself up and keep going.”

“That never happens in space,” Gabe said. “Things collide and explode, collide and absorb each other, but mostly it’s…”

Tyson waited for the rest of the sentence. He thought Gabe had fallen asleep from the pain meds, maybe, but then he looked over and saw that Gabe was still awake and sitting back in his seat, seatbelt across his chest. They were winding through the development where Tyson lived: there were cars parked in driveways, cars passing them on the other side of the road, the occasional stupid teenager revving their engine and roaring past in an extremely dangerous way when these streets were as twisty as they were. Lots of houses in his development still had their lights on and Tyson could see from quick little glances people moving around, TVs flashing with whatever people were watching, people walking down driveways and rolling the trash out. 

“Space was so empty,” Gabe finally said. “Even our cluster of thousands, we were so far apart from each other. Looking at the stars from here, you would think we were together at a wonderful party, beautiful and twinkling and watching everything happening down here. But space is so _big_ and it keeps us so far _apart_ —”

Tyson finally arrived at his driveway and sharply turned, parking his car next to Nate’s. He turned off the car and looked at Gabe, who still looked distant and lost, like he was still out there in space, so singular and alone. Tyson reached for his hand and clutched it hard, waiting for Gabe’s eyes to meet his. 

When they finally did, Tyson—god, he had no idea he could be so grateful to have someone look at him and _see him_. 

“I’ll stay with you as long as I can, for as long as you want me to stay,” Tyson said. “Here or anywhere.”

“Okay,” Gabe said. 

“Living is pretty hard, and we’re gonna have it pretty easy,” Tyson said. “But I’ve got you, okay?”

“I’ve got you,” Gabe repeated to Tyson, looking as earnest as he seemed to know how. 

Tyson nodded at him, then released his hand. “Okay, let’s—”

A hand slapped Tyson’s windshield and both Tyson and Gabe jumped back into their seats and yelled in surprise, but of course it was just Nate.

“Dude, you fucking scared the shit out of me!” Tyson said as he opened his door.

“DUDE? YOU FUCKING PROPOSED TO ME AND THEN DISAPPEARED _ALL NIGHT_ ,” Nate yelled back.

“I’m sorry, okay!” Tyson said.

“I know you are!” 

“I want to hug you now!”

“I’m really angry you didn’t hug me the minute you opened the fucking door, jackass!”

That being said, Nate pulled Tyson into a bone-crushing, earth-shattering hug, holding him closer than anyone had held Tyson in years, probably. Nate adjusted his hold and pulled Tyson closer, his hand firmly on the back of Tyson’s head and clutching him like he was never going to let Tyson go.

“I’m so sorry,” Tyson whispered as he pulled Nate just as close.

They held each other until Tyson’s arms earnestly began to ache, from holding Nate, from hustling Gabe through the woods—oh shit, Gabe.

“Uh, who the fuck is standing on the other side of your car, staring at me like he’s going to eat me and also cry?” Nate asked. 

Tyson and Nate pulled apart, the two of them trying to look a little less like the hot messes they were, then realizing how stupid an attempt that was. Tyson turned around to Gabe, who had opened the backseat and pulled out his crutches and the little hospital bag of medications and instructions and leftover Wendy’s that were probably his only possessions in the entire world. Fuck, who or what was Gabe and why did he cut to the fucking _heart_ of Tyson?

“Nate, this is Gabe,” Tyson said. 

“You’re his best friend,” Gabe said, looking at Nate not with surprise, but with a solemn acceptance that was going to destroy Tyson. 

“Uh,” Nate said.

“So remember when I said I was going to drive into the mountains and get you that falling star?” Tyson asked, extremely casually.

Nate blinked twice, then looked at Tyson.

“So you went somewhere and picked up instead?”

“What? _No_!”

“I’m the star.” Gabe sighed. “I fell. Apparently I look like this when I’m not—” Gabe did a little wave towards the sky. Nate and Tyson both looked up; Tyson knew all this, of course, and he looked up anyway, unsure of what he was going to see this time. He knew he wouldn’t look up at the sky and see anything normal ever again. 

“Okay,” Nate said. “Uh. It’s cold. Let get inside—wait, what happened to your leg?”

“I fell,” Gabe said. “From space.”

“Sure,” Nate said. “Cool cool cool.”

“Nate,” Tyson sighed. “Remember what I said about trusting me?”

Nate opened the front door, both he and Tyson standing aside as Gabe slowly used his crutches to come up the path and let himself into Tyson’s house. Tyson closed the door behind all of them and looked at his house, trying to see it with Gabe’s new-to-everything eyes. 

“Um, wait, here, let me take the leftover Wendy’s, I’ll put it in the fridge,” Tyson said. “Oh! Okay! Really quick tour, because I’m exhausted and you must be like, ready to sleep for a century or something, so.” Tyson pointed down the hall. “Bathroom’s down there.”

“They have toilets in space?” Nate asked.

“I used one at the hospital,” Gabe answered. “But thank you for asking.”

Shit, Gabe was stubborn and proud and smart and Tyson had promised to live with him for as long as he wanted, _fuck_ , this was a disaster in the making. 

“And the guest room is on the ground floor, it’s that door right over there,” Tyson pointed. “Um, this big room over here is the kitchen—where the food and water live. If you’re thirsty or hungry, help yourself. Shit, you should hydrate, I fed you like a year’s worth of sodium.”

Tyson focused every single atom of his being on filling one of his huge water bottles with water, letting Nate and Gabe hover behind him, both of them filling the room with a weird tension that made Tyson feel like he wanted to melt into the floor and sink straight into the earth. He handed the bottle to Gabe and smiled. “Here, drink this. Not all at once.”

The three of them stood in the kitchen in silence, Gabe taking slow sips from the water bottle while watching Tyson, while Nate watched Gabe and Tyson watched both of them. Eventually Tyson said, “Well. It’s late.”

“Yeah, I’ve got practice early tomorrow,” Nate said slowly. “So. Gabe’s in your guest room. I’ll crash with you?” Nate suddenly remembered, well, _everything_ , and said, “Unless that’s—listen we’ve gotta talk, but I meant it, Tys, okay?”

“I know,” Tyson said. “Yeah, you’re crashing with me, of course.”

“I don’t—” Gabe cleared his throat suddenly, then looked at his water bottle and at the kitchen and anywhere except Tyson or Nate. “I’m sorry, I know you have—there’s talking involved, but I don’t want to sleep alone.”

“Oh,” Tyson said.

“Oh,” Nate echoed.

“Is it… is the bed large?” Gabe asked.

“Nate, take my bed upstairs,” Tyson said. “I’ll sleep down here.”

Nate pursed his lips, showing Tyson exactly how crazy he thought Tyson was. Tyson smiled and nodded, letting Nate understand that he knew he was crazy but they were just going to go with it for a while.

“Good night, Nate,” Gabe announced, then linked his fingers with Tyson and led him exactly in the direction of the guest bedroom, proudly walking with one crutch and minimal grunts of pain. 

Tyson looked over his shoulder and mouthed at Nate: _DUDE, RIGHT?_

Nate didn’t look impressed, but that was a Nate problem.

*

Tyson offered Gabe some spare clothes to sleep in, specifically shorts that showed way too much leg on Gabe and a shirt that looked like Gabe had been stuffed into it like sausage casing. 

“So we’re going shopping tomorrow,” Tyson nodded. “Cool. Great.”

Gabe looked at himself in the mirror, familiarized himself with the feeling of looking ridiculous, and then swung his arms around for Tyson’s amusement in the too-small shirt. Tyson laughed like a jackass because, god, _what_. 

“That was a thank you,” Gabe explained as he took the shirt off again. “For staying with me. For everything tonight.”

“Oh,” Tyson said. “Usually we just say _thank you_.”

“I know,” Gabe said. “But you like to laugh.”

Tyson smiled at him. He didn’t have words, not really, for that feeling of having someone hold up a mirror to his own heart and show him that they knew him. It didn’t happen a lot—Nate, Jamie, his sister in exclusively terrible moments, and maybe that was it. Gabe stood over on his side of the bed until he figured out how to lower himself on his good leg. 

“Oh shit, let me get extra pillows from the couch,” Tyson said. Once Tyson returned with an excessive number of throw pillows, he climbed into bed and set himself to making the familiar pillow formation that always worked for him when he had to elevate something at night. “I’ve fucked up a lot of my body in my day and I’ve had to sleep with all different parts of me elevated, it’s hilarious. This is Barrie tested-and-approved to keep your leg comfortable and let you sleep.”

“You keep saying that,” Gabe said. “Why are you hurt so often?”

“I play hockey, man. When you’re a pro, it’s in the job description. Nate and I are on the same team here in Denver, and we’ve played for Team Canada a bunch of times.”

“Can I watch you play?”

“Sure, we can pull up some old games on TV.”

“I mean, can I watch you play here? Isn’t there a practice tomorrow?”

“No, no,” Tyson said. “I don’t play anymore. I had to retire last season.”

“Is twenty-seven young to retire?” Gabe raised his eyebrows at him, a touch suspicious. “Where’s your phone? I want to look up the average lifespan of a human before you surprise me and die like a mayfly. You keep doing things like coughing and retiring.”

Tyson laughed, way too obnoxiously than he usually allowed himself to laugh in front of someone as hot as Gabe. They watched each other, smiling softly, before Tyson remembered to answer Gabe’s question. “Yeah. It’s young. But I had a bad tear in one of my knees and I kept re-injuring it, and the doctors finally told me: you need surgery and you have to stop, you’re making it worse every time you play, so. I stopped.”

“I’m sorry,” Gabe said. 

Tyson shrugged, fluffed the pillows under Gabe’s leg a little more, and then settled back against his own pillows. “It’s okay. I’m getting used to it. I need to figure out what to do with my life. Maybe I’ll go to school, you know? I’ve got my whole life ahead of me. I can do anything.” Tyson nudged Gabe with his elbow. “So do you. You can do anything. You’re like, super smart for someone literally born yesterday. We can tell people you’re from Sweden and the village with your records burned down in a terrible yule goat fire.”

Gabe burst out laughing and turned his head slightly so he could look at Tyson. No, he was _beaming_. That warm glow that Tyson thought he had imagined was very much real, and very much in his guest bedroom, emanating from the smiling, handsome man lying next to him. Tyson turned onto his side so he could face Gabe; as he did so, he knew that he was grinning like an idiot. 

Then again, so was Gabe, so Tyson didn’t mind too much. 

“You’re glowing,” Tyson said.

“You noticed,” Gabe said. "What do stars do, Tyson?"

Tyson was too much an idiot to respond and honestly, it was probably for the best. Gabe reached between them and found Tyson’s hand, linking their fingers together as he closed his eyes. Tyson almost pointed out that people didn’t typically sleep like that, but he wasn’t _that_ fucking stupid.

“Tell me one good thing about living on Earth,” Gabe whispered, his eyes closed. 

“Just one? Gabe, I haven’t even taken you to Dairy Queen. You’ve only had a Frosty—you haven’t had _ice cream_. That shit’s gonna rock your fucking _world_.”

Gabe laughed again and squeezed Tyson’s hand. Tyson squeezed back and settled into his pillows. As the rising sun warmed the heavy curtains in the bedroom, he watched Gabe’s chest rise and fall with every breath. Gabe still glowed as he slept, quiet and warm so close to Tyson. Tyson squeezed his hand again as he felt himself drifting off to sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

Tyson woke up full-blown cuddling Gabe: head on Gabe’s shoulder, arm draped across his chest, knee against Gabe’s hip, drool seriously becoming a situation. When Tyson opened his eyes, Gabe’s skin still faintly glowed. 

“Fuck, I’m sorry,” Tyson said as he gently sat up, then shut his mouth because Gabe was still oblivious to the world. Tyson rubbed the sleep from his eyes, then took in the whole Gabe scene in front of him—his leg in its bright purple cast still elevated on the pillows, his other leg bent at an angle, one arm draped across his hips (fingers still curled from when they had held Tyson’s), his other arm artfully draped above his head like those too-hot paintings of martyrs at every art museum Tyson had ever visited. Yeah, Gabe belonged in a museum or a runway, not in Tyson’s sad little guest bed in his little house. 

He grabbed his phone and silently crept out of the guest room. He wasn’t surprised to see Nate sitting on his couch, playing on his phone, Nate’s dog Henry sitting at his feet and gently swishing his tail around. Henry perked up to see Tyson and skidded over, nosing at Tyson because he hadn’t seen him in two entire days. 

“I missed the whole day, huh?” Tyson asked.

“Nah, it’s barely afternoon,” Nate said. “He’s still sleeping?”

“Yeah, I drooled all over him, it was great.”

Nate made a face and put his phone away. “So.”

“Yeah,” Tyson said.

The two of them sat in silence, Henry lying across both their feet.

“Gabe’s gonna stay with me for a while,” Tyson finally said. “As long as he wants. I think—he told me he’s lonely. Super lonely. Like, I thought I was bad, but he’s—”

“Yeah, how much of that horseshit from last night do you expect me to believe? All of it?”

“Oh yeah, all of it. It’s absolutely true.”

“That guy's a star, _the_ star that fell over Denver while we were sitting outside having the weirdest conversation of our lives. You left me, drove into the mountains, found him, brought him back here, and he’s going to live with you… indefinitely.”

“He was lying in the crater, Nate,” Tyson said. “I’ll tell you exactly where, if it’s not all over the local news already.”

“Oh, it’s all over the local news, and even weirder is how it _should_ have been an impact event, because there’s a crater, but there’s nothing to show for it except a clearing of trees. Like, if it was a meteorite and it shattered, there would be pieces everywhere. And there’s nothing.”

“Well, he stood up and got in my car and he’s sleeping in my guest room. This isn’t like the fish dude movie, I’m not gonna turn him over to be dissected and stuff. But do you believe me?”

“I do,” Nate exhaled. “I do. I don’t know how you’ve managed to top yourself with crazy _twice_ in 24 hours, but you did and I believe you. Now what?”

“Hear me out: he’s my boyfriend Gabe from Sweden.”

“Oh, come on.”

“What? I can’t have a super hot Swedish boyfriend?”

“That you never told any of us about!” 

Yeah, that was a problem. “It’s complicated. Deeply, queerly complicated.”

“You know, the most unbelievable part of your story so far might be that you kept your insanely hot Swedish boyfriend a secret for more than ten minutes,” Nate said. “And I think the fact that you've _acquired_ a decent-looking star-alien-guy and instantly have to make him your boyfriend is a testament to how right I am.”

Tyson considered it for a minute, then nodded because (as always) Nate had his fucking number.

“So when did you meet?”

“Worlds. Like, three years ago.”

“He’s not—”

“He was a _spectator_ ,” Tyson clarified. “He’s _barely_ into hockey. And we’ve had a long-distance, on-again/off-again romance that could never work—”

“For deeply, queerly complicated reasons.”

“Exactly, and now that I’m…” Tyson had to take a moment before he continued. “Now that I’ve retired, we decided to give it a shot.”

“Okay,” Nate said. “So. That could actually work.”

“Awesome, thank you for approving of our lies.”

“So what are you and Gabe gonna do? Like… we have a couple of home games and then we’re on the road pretty much forever. Are you two just gonna… hang out in Denver? Forever?”

“I don’t know,” Tyson admitted. 

Nate nodded, then clapped his hand on Tyson’s knee. “Okay, go wake your sleeping beauty, we’ve gotta get both of you fed and I already ate everything in your fridge.”

“What? I _just_ went shopping.”

“Yeah, well, you shouldn’t have stressed me out last night and left me alone in your house with nothing to do but eat everything and watch an entire season of _Top Chef_ , so.”

“What the fuck! We were _saving that_ to watch _together_ , Nathan.”

“You’re picking up lunch or I’ll tell you who wins.”

Tyson huffed and gently prodded Henry from his feet. “This is why I had to get a boyfriend in Sweden and why our marriage of convenience could never work.”

“You’re not allowed to joke about that for at least two years!”

*

After one of the more epic restaurant arguments Tyson and Nate had in recent memory, they ended up at Tyson’s favorite sushi place. It was a great choice, when Tyson wasn’t being judged _really_ hard by Gabe with every piece of fish he ate.

“This was out there,” Gabe said. “Sushi was out there. In the _world_. And you fed me nuggets from a bag.”

“First of all, you’re being kind of a snob for someone who was wearing silk pajamas in a hole 24 hours ago, who had literally never eaten a meal before _I_ introduced you to _Wendy’s_. Second, it was the only thing open!” Tyson said. “Everything in this state closes at like, 8pm.”

“I need one of those phones,” Gabe said as he pointed to the phone in Tyson’s hand. “If you’re going to insist on—” Tyson and Nate watched an honest-to-fuck former ball of hydrogen actually make fucking air quotes at them. “— _Linear time_ to measure things, I’m going to need a frame of reference. And I want to listen to more of that music.”

“Oh yeah, shit, I’ve gotta get _Mamma Mia_ streaming somewhere,” Tyson said. 

“You introduced him to ABBA and now you’re going to introduce him to Pierce Brosnan trying to sing ABBA?” Nate asked. “Gabe, dump him. Dump his ass. If you were actually Swedish, you would object to this wholeheartedly.”

“Don’t bias him against the greatest work of American cinema—”

“Oh my _god_ —”

Gabe had a good enough handle on his chopsticks to steal one of Tyson’s rolls with masago off his plate, and not drop it when Tyson squawked in protest and tried to steal it back. Too late; Gabe popped it in his mouth and looked innocently at Tyson.

“I like those best,” Gabe said. 

“Let your boyfriend share your plate, Tyson,” Nate said.

“You’re a younger sibling, Nate, that’s not how it flies here,” Tyson said.

"So are you, dumbass." 

Neither of them bet on Gabe reaching a hand out to rest on Tyson’s, or Gabe giving Tyson the softest, most devastating eyes either of them had ever seen. 

“Tyson? Please?” Gabe asked.

Tyson swallowed hard and, because Gabe asked so nicely, slid his plate across to Gabe to let him take up the last roll he wanted. Gabe picked it up with his fingers and slowly ate it, staring at Tyson, who was trying hard to think of anything besides _holy fucking shit I’m so fucking FUCKED_. 

“So,” Nate said. “We should get another order of those, huh.”

“If Tyson wants,” Gabe said.

“I hate… both of you?” Tyson said. “Yeah. It’s both of you.” 

Gabe laughed and flashed all his beautiful teeth at Tyson and oh, he was so fucking _gone_.

“Gabe, Tyson and I were talking about what to tell the team about you,” Nate finally said. “Like Tyson’s retired but he’s not—we still see him every day, you know? He’s still our family. So you, this guy, suddenly living with him—”

“Do you want to be my fake long-distance boyfriend I met in Sweden three years ago during a hockey tournament?” Tyson blurted out.

Gabe had stolen something else off of Tyson’s plate (salmon, probably, and not because his side of the sushi boat was empty but because he liked Tyson’s attention and wasn’t that just the story of Tyson’s fucking life) and he looked only a little surprised at Tyson’s outburst. 

“Okay,” Gabe said. 

“I figured you could be like, a friend of someone on the Swedish team who I ended up meeting after a game or something,” Tyson said casually. “And we kept in touch and met up sometimes, but it couldn’t really work until now when I retired.”

“Why not?” Gabe asked. 

“Being a partner to a hockey player, it’s hard,” Tyson said. “You probably didn’t want to be with someone who would be gone half the year, waiting around for me to come back.”

Gabe looked panicked. “You’ll be gone half the year?” 

“No, no, I mean—when I traveled with the team, we had a lot of road trips. Half our games are in other cities playing those teams.”

“82 games total,” Nate said. “Not including the playoffs. Half of those are away, too.”

“You travel so much,” Gabe said. His eyes were firmly on Tyson, but his voice sounded almost wistful. “What's your favorite city?”

“Oh, man, hard to say. Probably not a hockey city, of all the places I’ve been,” Tyson laughed. “But of the hockey towns? Probably Vancouver. I grew up in a lot of places, but that area is special. There’s beautiful rocky beaches up there, and there’s seals and _whales_.”

“Whales?” Gabe asked. Tyson nodded. “I wish I could see whales.”

“I mean,” Nate laughed. “You’ve only got the rest of your life.” 

Tyson licked his lips and looked across the table at Gabe, whose eyes darted away as he looked down at his plate and, for the first time, picked at his food. 

Suddenly, Tyson had an idea.

*

Tyson had a dozen doctors and specialists and therapists, but Kimberly was his _therapist_. She was older than Tyson, but not by much. There was something extremely comforting in seeking help for putting his life in order from an extremely self-possessed young woman with glasses and a perfect ponytail, staring him down over the edge of her glasses. 

"You proposed to Nate," Kimberly said.

"I wasn't like. Serious."

"You said that he was really upset."

"Yeah but _I_ wasn't? Oh god, is that bad?"

Kimberly looked at him. "Is it?" Tyson stared blankly for a moment, so Kimberly brushed it off in that casual way she did where she wanted Tyson to hold it for a moment while they worked something out. "And that same night, after you proposed to Nate and then disappeared for hours, your on-again/off-again boyfriend from Sweden shows up in America, at your house, and he tells you his life has fallen apart, can he stay with you. And Nate and Henry the dog sleep upstairs and you and _Gabe_ sleep in the guest room, and you wake up this morning and everyone's fine."

"You got it."

"Just checking," she replied. She sometimes took notes during their meetings; when she did, she would roll her chair back to her desk, scribble for a few short seconds, then turn back to Tyson, glasses pushed back up the bridge of her nose. Tyson watched her go, pushing herself along the office carpet using her absurdly chunky heels.

"Do you have a plan?" Kimberly continued to scribble. "For Gabe?"

"Sorta but not really," he admitted. "Like. Uh. I'm gonna introduce him to the boys, for one. Get him some friends. Friends are important."

He hadn't told Kimberly _everything_ , like that Gabe had crashed to Earth eighteen hours ago or that Nate had driven Gabe back to their neighborhood so Gabe could borrow some of Nate's clothes until Tyson took him shopping tonight or tomorrow. Gabe was Tyson's on-again/off-again boyfriend that he hadn't seen in a few years, who had a sudden family crisis that forced him to leave Sweden very quickly. 

"So this guy," Kimberly continued. "You met him at a hockey tournament three years ago, spent like—what, a week? With him? An hour or two per day with him? And you've been emailing and texting ever since, and now he lives with you."

"That's... pretty much it, yeah."

"Are you okay with that?"

"Yeah."

Kimberly looked over her shoulder, her eyes peering at him over the edge of her glasses. "I'd be freaked the hell out. I mean, all those expectations and hopes—"

"I don't—really have those," Tyson admitted. 

"For Gabe?"

"For... anything?" Tyson swallowed whatever was in his throat and looked out the window at the mountains in the distance, the parking lot outside Kimberly's office window. The sun was really strong in Denver, when he actually got the chance to look out a window and stuff. "It's not like we were exclusive or anything, you know? And I'm not gonna pressure him or anything, like—more than anything, he fell and I caught him, and he needs a place to stay and I can give him that."

"Huh," Kimberly said. She took more notes. 

"What?"

She put her pen down and turned away from her desk. She edged closer to Tyson, her chunky heels digging into the carpet as she settled into her chair again. 

"You seem very... indifferent, I think, to this on-again/off-again dream guy from your past who has suddenly become _extremely_ real and present. I'll be real: if this was me? I meet an absolute knockout at a Virtue and Moir exhibition, we have an intense and wild time together, we email and text for _three years_ , and suddenly they want to come live with me and be my love? Tys. I'd be _freaked_."

"I don't think it's like that, though," Tyson said. "Like, yeah, our story's cute but—" Tyson swallowed again because he was a constant liar and his next lie would be so hilariously true he wanted to laugh about it. In fact, maybe he would. 

"It's cute but it's not real."

"Which part?"

"The whirlwind romance part," Tyson said. "Some random hookups in Prague and some horny texts don't make a romance, even if they're across three years. But he needs someone and he needs help and I can help."

Kimberly nodded. She folded her hands and watched Tyson for a moment. It made him feel like he couldn't escape or run from his bullshit, which was exactly why he and his insurance paid her as much as they did. 

"Do you really think you don't have hopes and dreams?" she asked. 

"What? Did I say that?"

She nodded. "I specifically mentioned expectations and hopes about Gabe, and you said you didn't have any about him, or anything in general."

"Oh," Tyson said. "Yeah, I mean. I hoped I'd win a Stanley Cup? I bet if the team ever does, the boys would be nice enough to let me hold it, but like. My name won't be on there."

"Is that it?"

"I guess?"

She tilted her head. "So why'd you write to Gabe all those years, if you knew nothing would come of it? You just liked his company?" Apparently Tyson was quiet long enough and his expression blank enough that she smiled at him and shrugged. "It's okay if you don't have an answer. Just something to think about."

"I expected to be a hockey player for at least another five years, ten if I was lucky," Tyson said quickly. "That was it. I banked everything on that. I didn't have the energy or the—the bandwidth, I guess, to hope for more. And as for Gabe, like." 

Gabe was a lie, of course, the story of Gabe, the long-distance love he had kept a secret from literally everyone, except he wasn't a lie. Tyson had ongoing texts with dozens of guys across North America, another dozen playing in Europe and Russia and even China. They were guys he could hook up with when they were in each other's cities and countries, guys he cultivated half-hearted relationships with because that was all they could have with each other. 

It hadn't even been a year since the first (retired) hockey guy had come out. He had quietly posted on Instagram about marrying his husband on a dock somewhere and they took a comments-off fishing honeymoon while the entire fucking league imploded. None of the guys who Tyson texted and kissed and fucked wanted _that_. Kimberly knew that, Tyson had told her that, but it felt like he wasn't clear enough.

"Gabe wasn't any more real than the others," Tyson finally said. "This is gonna sound awful, but I have so many dudes in so many cities. I have so many guys who only text me when the schedule puts me within fucking distance and I didn't think Gabe was any different. If I was ever in Sweden, if he was ever in Denver, we could hook up and laugh about it and that would be it. I didn't—" Tyson looked out into the parking lot again. "Nate's kinda the only guy who's ever needed me as much as I needed him, and wanted me as much as I wanted him. That's sad but like, that's #BestFriends, right?"

Kimberly nodded at him. She glanced at a clock on her bookshelves and Tyson cleared his throat.

"Oh, also, hey, could you do me a favor?" Tyson asked. "For me and for Gabe? You know that letter to management you're always talking about writing? Could you write it?"

*

“Now who let this motherfucker back into the rink?” EJ crowed as Tyson walked into changing room at practice the next day. “God, Tys, you had me worried when I hadn’t seen you in like—oh, let me check our helpful TYSON TIME board.”

“What?” Tyson whirled around, then burst out laughing when he saw the new whiteboard in the changing room. Someone had taped on it an awful picture of Tyson smiling and written TYSON TIME in red and blue, and below it: 3 DAYS SINCE WE GOT TB. 

“Finally, I am the only Tyson,” he laughed. “Man, you’re all assholes.” 

“Did you dress up so pretty just for the love parade or is there some filthy ulterior motive?” EJ asked. True to #BestFriends form, Nate left his stall to erase the 3 on the TYSON TIME board, and he stayed standing so he could watch the rest of the room while Tyson spoke. 

“So, uh, you haven’t seen the last of me. Obviously,” Tyson started. “I talked to my doctors and therapists, and I talked to management, but I wanted to check with all of you before I did something that—well, that affects all of you.”

“Please come back to hockey, I don’t want to be the only Tyson,” Josty shouted. “Don’t leave, I don’t care, okay, I’ll change my name to Brian or something, I can’t handle being the only Tyson.”

“Oh my god, shut up, you beautiful stupid angel,” Tyson said. “No, it’s—” Tyson sighed.

“Nate,” EJ interrupted. “What’s Tyson trying to say?”

Nate shrugged. EJ glared at him before turning back to Tyson.

“I have a boyfriend and his name is Gabe,” Tyson said. “We’ve been on-again/off-again for a couple of years and now that I’m not playing anymore, we wanted to give ourselves a real chance so... he’s here. He moved here from Sweden. He’s moved in with me.” Tyson lifted a hand and rubbed at the back of his neck because the murmuring in the room was starting to get to him. 

“We’re so happy for you,” Soda said, very loudly and very firmly. “We can’t wait to meet him. Wait, is he here? _Here_ here? Is that why you’re so pretty today?”

“I don’t know where all these comments about my outfits are coming from, I dress _really_ well,” Tyson argued.

EJ put a hand over his heart. “You’re our gay disaster and we love you.” 

“Ugh, I know,” Tyson said. “But I’m not done. Uh. So. Speaking of, you know, meeting Gabe and getting to know him—what if we traveled with you guys? Would that mess up your team dynamic and stuff? A couple of freeloaders hanging around and eating all your plane sushi—”

“Oh my god,” Josty said. “Not only do we get to like, meet your secret husband—”

“Boyfriend, just a boyfriend,” Tyson interrupted.

“But we get to _travel_ with him? With _both_ of you? And you’ll be at all our games and stuff?”

“Okay, that’s one very enthusiastic vote yes and I’m a little concerned at the teacher’s pet vibe I’m getting from you,” Tyson said. “In the name of Tyson, chill.”

“Dude,” EJ said. “Of course you and your man are coming with us. Like. Come on.”

Tyson exhaled for what felt like the first time all day. “Gabe grew up really sheltered, so he hasn’t traveled much at all—not in Sweden, not in Europe, especially not here. We always knew the travel would be hard if he moved here earlier, while I was still playing, but now that I’m retired—”

“Like a pre-honeymoon kinda honeymoon,” Nate said, raising his eyebrows.

"Not my husband! Not a honeymoon!"

“I’m surprised Tys actually asked us and didn’t try to pass his boyfriend off as a new reporter or intern,” Kerfy said. 

“We get to skip suffering over Tyson’s total lack of game and watch him…” EJ trailed off and tilted his head at Tyson. “What _are_ you like with a boyfriend? Is he here? Like, in the rink today? Can we meet him? TYSON, PLEASE.”

“We’ll be on the flight to Anaheim tonight,” Tyson said. “Try not to scare him when we’re all trapped together in a metal tube seven miles above the planet.” 

“Whatever, can we hug yet?” EJ asked. He stood up on his skates and held his arms out like the handsome toothless Frankenhockey he was. 

“I didn’t put on my best suit to have all of you wrinkle the shit out of it.”

“This is your best suit? God, Tyson. _God_.”

*

When Gabe stepped onto the plane, he reached for Tyson’s hand and linked their fingers. That, somehow, made the team’s silence even more deafening. 

“So this is Gabe,” Tyson said loudly. “Act like fucking people.”

The silence stretched out for a few more seconds until EJ reached over and put Nate in a headlock as he pointed at Gabe.

“YOU DIDN’T MENTION?? THAT TYSON’S BOYFRIEND?? IS HOT?????” 

“He’s all right!” Nate said. “He’s like, Old Navy hot! Who mentions that?”

“He’s the most beautiful human being I’ve literally ever seen!” EJ said. 

“Tyson, he kinda looks like an angel,” Josty said. “Are you getting touched by an angel?”

“Stop making it weird!” Tyson snapped. “This is my totally normal and human Swedish boyfriend, Gabe.” He sighed and looked up at Gabe. “I told you they were weird.”

Gabe held up a hand and smiled at everyone. “Hi guys.” He added something in Swedish and Soda’s eyes lit up. “Is there food on this flight?”

“EJ, let Nate go and stop blocking the aisle, we’ve gotta sit down and stuff, his leg needs to rest. Don't make me beat you with the other crutch.”

“Gabe hasn’t _met_ everyone,” EJ whined. 

“We’ve got three hours on this plane, he’s gonna meet everyone whether I like it or not,” Tyson said as he led Gabe and his crutches down the aisle to Tyson’s usual row. “Don’t overwhelm him!”

EJ backed up the aisle a little so he could let Tyson enter the row and Gabe settle down. “I’m Erik, EJ, I’m the captain and the most important person in Tyson’s life, after you and the night shift checkout guy at Safeway who doesn’t tweet out all of Tyson’s midnight shame buys.”

“Chuck introduced you to that kebab place that you can’t stop raving about, so treat him with a little more respect, man,” Tyson said. 

“I was only stating the facts!” EJ said. “I know my place!” EJ took the seat across the aisle from Gabe, crossed his legs, and rested his chin on his hand. “So what do you see in him? Like, Nate claims he has a good personality, but Tyson imprinted on him way too young. What’s your excuse?”

While Tyson tried to remember where the barf bags were located on this one-way farce to hell, he glanced over quickly at Gabe to see if he had to switch with some of the team staff at the front of the plane to save Gabe from literally going supernova on the plane and destroying an entire hockey team because chirping wasn’t his first language. 

He watched Gabe stare at EJ for a minute, then throw his head back and laugh a beautiful, musical sound that took everyone in a three-row radius by surprise. 

“He and Nate said you were funny,” Gabe said. “But no one’s funnier to me than Tyson.”

“Oh, you’re gonna fit in with this team _just_ fine,” EJ said. “We all think Tyson’s a real hoot. A cute, sexy, kissable little hoot.”

Gabe nodded and smiled but then, to Tyson’s surprise, he turned in his seat to Tyson himself, who was slouching low enough in his seat to almost disappear. Gabe, sitting up straight and tall, towered over him in his seat, and he reached out a hand slowly, running the back of one of his fingers down Tyson’s cheek. “Are you all right?” he asked, quiet enough that the eavesdroppers around them would really have to strain to listen.

“Yeah,” Tyson said. Gabe’s finger was still close enough that—god, Tyson could have turned his face a little and taken Gabe’s finger into his mouth, maybe even two, _and then what_. “Yeah, I’m okay. What about you? The guys everything I warned you about? EJ, at least?”

“They’re fine,” Gabe said. “Do you mind if I—”

“If you—”

Gabe searched Tyson’s face for a long moment, then leaned in and kissed him. His hand cupped the side of Tyson’s face, perfectly smooth and cool against the stubble on Tyson’s cheek. Tyson’s eyes fluttered closed as he leaned up and into the kiss, opening his mouth under Gabe’s. Their tongues met and, fuck, Tyson could have slouched in this seat, kissing Gabe forever, if he didn’t become painfully aware of their audience after a moment. He pulled away slightly and pressed another quick kiss to Gabe’s lips before he looked to see Gabe’s reaction.

That was Gabe’s first kiss. His first kiss in a body Gabe had owned all of three days, his first kiss was a _guy_ and it was _Tyson_ and Gabe—he looked so calm and sure, with the tiniest smirk on his lips like he knew how much Tyson liked it, how much he wanted to do it again. 

Tyson sat up straight in his seat, adjusted his seatbelt, and clasped Gabe’s hand loosely in his own. He leaned over slightly and saw EJ still sitting in the aisle across from Gabe, staring at them, his eyebrows raised and a look of smug satisfaction on his face.

“As long as someone’s taking care of you, Brutes,” EJ said. “NATHAN. GET BACK HERE. These love birds are going to wreck my shit, I can’t be IN LOVE WITH LOVE before we play the fucking DUCKS.” 

*

The spell cast over the team— 

(—Not any actual “spell” with “magic” “cast” by the “guy who was a fallen star,” but rather the brief fantasy that Tyson and Gabe were in a completely plausible romantic relationship, and that Tyson was lovable and Gabe was in love with him—)

—Lasted until the moment they arrived at the hotel and Gabe and Tyson were alone in their room. As soon as the door shut on some of the guys catcalling past on the way to their own rooms, Gabe dropped one of his crutches, made it to the king-sized bed in three giant ill-advised hops, and threw himself across the bed with an epic, agonized whine. 

“Are you okay?” Tyson asked.

“Tyson,” Gabe moaned. “My leg hurts. The cast itches. My _leg_ itches. I think I smell. Bodies _smell_ , Tyson. And I’m tired. Do I ever stop being tired? This is ridiculous. We have to sleep _every_ night? For _hours_? My body will get tired and slower and more lethargic until I _have_ to sleep, like it's a hostage negotiation? How is _that_ fair?”

Tyson came over, picking up the crutches and setting them aside within Gabe’s reach, then sat on the bed next to Gabe. Gabe looked at him and his sulk turned into an exaggerated pout. 

“Sleep is awesome, man, you’ll get the hang of it.”

“But sleep happens at night! What do stars _do_ , Tyson, specifically at night?!”

“Cry like giant babies who could do with a couple of hours of silence to recharge? Like, don’t get me wrong: you’re a _super_ handsome, very put-together baby who totally convinced the guys you hadn’t crash-landed here literally this week. But also, a baby.”

“I’m a baby,” Gabe repeated. “A handsome, profoundly articulate baby, who can’t be blamed for any of the nonsense out of my handsome baby mouth.”

“Ugh, this is getting weird. You know what’ll help? A shower.”

“A shower of what?” 

Tyson made a face and Gabe sneered right back when Tyson didn’t appreciate his amazing joke, so Tyson reached over and gently pat his cheek. 

“I got you a present, and if you guessed it’s a cast sleeve so you can put a big bag around your leg and experience a _shower_ for the first time, you’re absolutely right.”

“Sure. Those words mean things.”

“Shut up, you literally learned every language on the planet from interstellar creeping, don’t act like you don’t know.”

“But it’s my leg,” Gabe whined. “Attached to a body that I _suppose_ is mine, for some reason. You should have bought me a wooden leg when I had the chance.”

“Oh my god, they are not as cool as you think they are.”

“I could have had a beautiful cherry wood leg, Tyson.”

“I’ll buy you a cherry wood night stand, how about that. Or a bookshelf. Something from IKEA, since you’re Swedish now.” Tyson left the bed. “Give me a few minutes so I can set up the little shower chair for you.”

“I feel emasculated,” Gabe said loudly. “Gender is a fiction, but I still feel that.”

“Because I folded out a chair for you? God, how did the dick plague infect you after just three hours on a plane with those jackasses?”

“You mean your closest friends and companions?”

“They know how I feel.” 

Some light assembly later, Gabe made his way into the bathroom, slightly less dressed but still in his pants for some reason. He leaned against the double sink and looked around at the bathroom, much larger than the one by the guest room in Tyson’s house.

“Are all hotels like this?”

“Bud, you have no idea.”

“I don’t! That’s why I asked!”

“Oh. Right.” Tyson laughed to himself and shook his head. “Yeah, this is mid-range luxury bathroom chic. Enjoy the novelty now.” At Gabe’s comment, though, he took a second look. “Actually, this is nicer than the room I usually get with the team, probably because of you. The other rooms have tubs and two queen-sized beds, none of this walk-in shower business.” 

“It’s nicer than your bathroom.”

“That’s because you’re using the guest bathroom, because you can’t use stairs yet,” Tyson said. “I saved the good stuff for the master suite upstairs.”

“You’ve been holding out on me! I want to see the nice bathroom!”

“You can’t use stairs yet!”

“I’ll crawl!”

“Stop using that as a threat, it’s just weird.”

“Your friends in front of you were talking about a cabin holiday with a hot tub,” Gabe said. “Do you have a hot tub in the magical upstairs bathroom you’ve forbidden me from seeing?”

“I’ve got one out in the back. It’s Colorado. Hot tubs are mandatory. But _you_ can’t get your cast wet.”

Gabe closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “This body is useless. I want a new one.”

Tyson laughed and took Gabe in again: he had managed to peel off his suit jacket and shirt and undershirt, but he was still wearing pants and that was a problem. Tyson lightly tapped Gabe’s hip. “Come on, pants off.”

“I need help,” Gabe said.

“The belt’s a start,” Tyson noted.

Gabe started to undo his belt, but Tyson thought a few steps ahead and stopped him with a hand on the buckle. “Hold on, just—go into the shower, sit on the little stool, then take your pants off. So you’re not hopping around and breaking something else.”

Gabe huffed and did as he was told, almost spitefully pulling off his pants and his briefs and letting them hang off his cast for Tyson to pick up. Tyson gave him a look and took them off, then held up the cast sleeve for his leg. “Put your foot into this and pull it up your leg while I take my clothes off,” Tyson said.

“What the shit is this?” Gabe asked. “It’s a bag with a very tiny mouth.”

“I don’t know, it was the best the drug store had to offer. It was this or I duct tape a garbage bag around your thigh.”

“This is _better_? And why are you getting undressed?”

“Because I’m helping you shower.”

“Is that why Nate is always at your house? I didn’t realize showering was a two-human job.”

“Oh! My! God! Put your foot in the bag and shut up!” 

“Nemo said I wasn’t supposed to let you be mean to me,” Gabe said, finally doing as he was told. “He said I looked too nice and too wholesome for someone like you.”

Tyson laughed. “Isn’t he in for a rude fucking awakening once he gets to know you.” 

Gabe showed off his leg in the cast sleeve, presenting it to Tyson very proudly, and Tyson gave him a nice little golf clap for his efforts. The shower had a handheld shower head, which Tyson kept away as the water warmed up to a decent temperature. He tested it on Gabe’s arm and then immediately used it to spray Gabe in the face.

“Come on!” Gabe sputtered. 

“Showers are more effective this way.”

“I should have asked for a sponge bath.”

“Who told you about sponge baths?!”

“Three hours is a _very_ long time with those perverts you call your friends.”

“God,” Tyson sighed as he hosed Gabe down. “I mean, you’re not wrong, I’m just disappointed you were corrupted that quickly. What else did they say to you?”

“I’ll never tell.”

Tyson sprayed him in the face again, then said, “What? I’m just getting your hair wet. Hold the shower head so I can do your hair.” 

The walk-in shower was particularly nice, with enough space for two guys as big as Tyson and Gabe to maneuver around each other, but not big enough for Tyson to hide from the random sprays from the shower head Gabe was holding. “Cut it out,” Tyson laughed. “Tip your head back. Let’s see how long you can go without getting shampoo in your brand new eyes.” 

Tyson had his hands in Gabe’s hair, lathering the shampoo, then slowed down and really fucking _thought_ about what he was doing: standing in front of the beautiful stranger he had met just days ago, massaging his scalp, both of them completely naked like this was something they did every day. The steam from the shower had fogged up the doors and tendrils drifted around them. Gabe tipped his head back obediently and closed his eyes, completely relaxed under Tyson’s fingers. Tyson used his nails and worked on his scalp; Gabe’s eyes fluttered open at that, catching sight of Tyson staring at him. He wondered how he looked to Gabe, because Gabe? To Tyson? Handsome, soft, trusting, relaxed, pink from the heat, _soaking wet_? It was a lot. 

“You can rinse,” Tyson finally said. “Just—yeah, wash it out.” 

Gabe nodded slowly. “What’s next?”

“Conditioner, but don’t tell the guys.”

“Can they not afford conditioner?”

Tyson laughed. “Their manliness, you know. Wouldn’t want to compromise their rugged hockey looks with luxurious hair.”

“Well, fuck them. I want that. I like your hair.”

“Aw, come on.”

“I do,” Gabe said. He tipped his head back again as Tyson worked in the conditioner. He seemed to bare more of his throat, overextending his neck to make Tyson reach further over him. God, he was easy, Tyson was so fucking _easy_. 

“Your curls are so—they’re not like anything anyone else has.”

“You’ve met like thirty people, you’ll be surprised.”

“Would you just—” Gabe reached up and grabbed Tyson’s wrist with his free hand. “Would you believe me when I tell you things? I _know_ I haven’t met all _seven billion_ people on the planet, Tyson, but I’ve looked at you and I’ve seen you and I like _you_ —your hair. I like how it looks. Stop telling me I don’t know things.”

Objectively, Gabe didn’t know things, but Tyson wasn’t so stubborn that he couldn’t let him have this little thing, that he thought Tyson’s hair was nice or whatever. 

“Okay,” Tyson said. “I’m sorry for doubting you. Thank you for the compliment.”

“Thank you for letting me pay you a compliment, Your Majesty, King of All Modesty.”

“All right, don’t push it.”

Gabe sprayed him in the face with water and, honestly, Tyson deserved that.

“Aren’t you going to wash your hair?” Gabe asked. 

“Yeah, sure. Might as well, since I’m already here.” Tyson went for more shampoo and quickly worked it into his hair, except there was Gabe’s hand again, this time on Tyson’s elbow.

“Why are you so rough with yourself?” Gabe asked. “Give me the bottle, take the stupid spray, let me do it.”

“What are you—”

“It felt nice when you did it,” Gabe said. “Let me do it for you.” 

“You know it’s not a—”

“TYSON.”

“Fine, Jesus, you’re so fucking bossy.” Tyson took the shower head and rinsed the shampoo out of his hair, then handed Gabe the travel bottle. He leaned in over Gabe, moved back with Gabe’s instructions, and let Gabe work the shampoo into his hair. Tyson closed his eyes—the better to avoid staring too obviously at the fucking _amazing_ dick that falling from space had granted Gabe, but that meant focusing on the feeling of Gabe’s fingers in his hair, the firm and thorough motion of Gabe’s fingers through his hair. After way too much time on his hair and, simultaneously, not enough, Gabe said, “Rinse.” Tyson obediently brought shower head up and rinsed out his hair, then straightened up and grabbed the conditioner for Gabe.

“Good, look at that,” Gabe said as Tyson leaned down again. “I didn’t even have to argue with you that you should condition your hair.”

Tyson laughed and leaned in a little, gently headbutting Gabe’s chin and listening to him laugh in surprise. “God, you’re just—”

Gabe combed the conditioner through with his fingers, same as Tyson had done even though Tyson’s hair was laughable compared to Gabe’s, and suddenly there was a finger under Tyson’s chin, tipping his face up. Tyson wiped his forehead with the back of his free hand and looked at Gabe, who was watching him and smiling at him. 

“Yeah?” Tyson asked. 

Gabe didn’t say anything; then again, Tyson was learning that Gabe liked to look. He had a piercing stare, but it was soft in certain moments with Tyson—their few nights sharing the same bed, stolen glances as they ate together, the kiss on the plane, here in the shower. 

“Your face,” Gabe said softly. “It’s so _much_.”

“What,” Tyson laughed. He was trying so, _so_ hard to be as soft as Gabe, but honestly he didn’t know if it was going to work. They were made of different stuff, weren’t they, no matter what Gabe saw through the shower steam and his brand new eyes. 

“Can I kiss you again?” Gabe asked.

Tyson nodded, then stood perfectly still as he waited for Gabe to kiss him. Gabe seemed to watch him for another moment before he leaned in and pressed his lips to Tyson’s. His hand reached up to the nape of Tyson’s neck, pulling him in as he opened his mouth beneath Tyson’s. 

Tyson kissed him back, then pulled away suddenly. He stared at Gabe for a long moment, then turned around and hung up the stupid showerhead above them before he turned back and kissed Gabe again. 

The problem and the miracle of Gabe was that Tyson _didn’t think_ while he was kissing him. Tyson leaned over him, this huge and beautiful man sitting in a ridiculous plastic shower seat with his leg in a plastic bag, and wanted to drink in everything that was Gabe. He bit Gabe’s lip, sucked his tongue, let his hands wander along Gabe’s neck, his shoulders, his back, his waist, whatever he could reach. He felt Gabe twitch and tense under him, twist and reach for more of Tyson, explore Tyson with his hands that hadn't explored anywhere else. He reached forward and wrapped his hands around the backs of Tyson’s thighs, pulling him hard and almost jolting the shower seat over in trying to get more of Tyson. 

At that, Tyson broke the kiss and laughed, then kissed Gabe again, softer, smaller kisses against Gabe’s lips that were useless as kisses when he was smiling so much.

Then again, Gabe was smiling, too. Equally fucking useless, then. 

“What’s so funny?” Tyson asked. He kissed Gabe’s cheeks, smooth and wet under Tyson’s lips, and Gabe’s beard, this perfect stupid beard he was literally _born with_ and Tyson could never have except like this. 

“I like kissing,” Gabe said. He pressed kisses to Tyson, too, the two of them somehow trying to out-kiss each other. Gabe was gently worrying his teeth against the side of Tyson’s neck and that wasn’t fair in the slightest.

“It’s pretty awesome,” Tyson agreed. “For your second kiss.”

“Are you going to keep count?”

Tyson pulled away from Gabe, then leaned in and kissed him again. “No,” he said. “Maybe.”

“I _like_ kissing,” Gabe laughed. “It’s the only thing that gets you to stop talking.”

“I’ll remember that,” Tyson said.

“ _I’ll_ remember that.” Gabe kissed Tyson again. “Is the shower over? Can I lie down on that bed again? Do we have to wear clothes?”

“Oh, fuck, I haven’t even used actual fucking _soap_ on you.”

“What? Tyson! There’s _more_ showering? This takes _forever_.”

Tyson grabbed the soap and shot Gabe a look as he lathered it between his hands. “I’m not the one who called a time-out for kissing, am I?”

“You didn’t call it, but you were there,” Gabe shot back. “I want the soap.”

It took another twenty or thirty years, but Tyson eventually declared them both Fucking Done and Showered and threw two thick hotel towels at Gabe while he grabbed one for himself and dried off. Some more creative maneuvering got Gabe out of the shower and back onto the bed, but cajoling and asking wouldn’t get him to put clothes on again. 

“It’s still pretty early,” Tyson said. “Time zones and everything, and we have a team dinner soon.”

“We have to eat again?”

“I mean, we can skip since we’re not burning as many calories as our friends _the athletes_ ,” Tyson said. “But yeah, they’ve gotta eat before and after practice, before and after workouts, before and after games—it’s a lot to keep up.”

“I’m exhausted just listening to you,” Gabe said. “But that’s also just you.”

“See? Now who’s the mean one?”

Gabe curled up on his good side and faced Tyson, drops of water still glistening on his chest, his thighs, anywhere those stray drops could find a spot to cling. Tyson wasn’t sure how obvious he should be in staring, but seeing as Gabe was staring at him, too, well. 

“I’m gonna kiss you again,” Tyson said.

“Fucking finally,” Gabe answered as he pulled Tyson in and kissed him again. 

Shower sex was cool, but there was nothing compared to a bed, and a huge one where Tyson could lean up and cover Gabe with his body, taking his time as he straddled Gabe’s good thigh. He kissed Gabe again and reached down, gently wrapping his fingers around Gabe’s cock and feeling Gabe tense underneath him, all of him lighting up and pressing against Tyson at the slightest touch. He gasped against Tyson’s mouth and pushed his hips up into Tyson’s grasp, ready to beg without the slightest thought of shame. Tyson swiped his thumb over the head of Gabe’s cock and slowed down when Gabe shook his head.

“It’s too much, I—” Gabe was breathing heavily, Tyson’s fingers loosely wrapped around him but not moving. Gabe opened his eyes again and stared into Tyson’s face, still breathing like he had been running sprints. “Okay, I think—touch me again? Tyson? Please?” 

If Tyson thought for a moment about anything he was doing, anything that was happening, he would probably wake up from this dream, alone in his bed, the past several days the most vivid and incredibly dream he had ever had. Instead, Tyson kept his eyes open and focused on Gabe’s face: the blue of his eyes, the length of his lashes, his lips as he panted. He could hear little sounds in Gabe’s throat, every slow stroke of Tyson’s hand up the length of his cock something that Gabe seemed to feel in every cell of his body, all of him giving himself over just to the strokes of Tyson’s hand. As they moved against each other, Tyson shifted so he could take both of them in hand, their slickness rubbing together in Tyson’s grasp. 

Gabe gasped again and shut his eyes, then whispered, “Yes, more, please.” 

Fuck, Gabe's whisper went straight to his dick. Tyson wanted—this needed to feel good, _amazing_ for Gabe. Tyson moved his hips against Gabe and leaned in to kiss the side of Gabe’s neck as Gabe breathed against him, tensed, and came all over Tyson’s hand, shaking underneath Tyson as he came down. 

Tyson leaned back and looked at Gabe: a bright red flush covered his body, his cheeks and his neck and his chest, come spilled over Tyson’s hand and on Gabe’s stomach. Gabe’s eyes were open, staring at the mess between them, then up at Tyson. He looked so overwhelmed that Tyson had to lean in and kiss him, cup his cheek and stroke his thumb over Gabe’s cheekbone and whisper against his mouth, _I’m here, I’m here_. 

As gently as anything, Gabe reached down between them and tentatively wrapped his fingers around Tyson’s cock, slowly stroking him. He slicked up his hand with the mess on his stomach and watched Tyson’s face so intently that Tyson had to shut his eyes and press his forehead to Gabe’s or he wouldn’t last at all. A few more strokes, a flick of Gabe’s wrist, just the right side of too much pressure, and Tyson came with an embarrassing cry that he couldn’t bury against Gabe’s neck. It rang out in the quiet of their room and all Tyson could hear was their breathing, rough and ragged against each other’s lips. 

“ _Fuck_ ,” Gabe whispered. 

“Yeah,” Tyson whispered. 

“We don’t need to shower again, do we?” Gabe asked.

Tyson laughed and pressed his forehead to Gabe’s again, and laughed until Gabe kissed him again, the best way to shut him the fuck up.

Tyson did clean up after them, then climb into bed and curl up together under the covers embarrassingly early. Tyson didn’t even realize he had fallen asleep until he woke with a start in the darkness. All the lights were off, but he was firmly in Gabe’s arms, his head on Gabe’s shoulder, Gabe warm and glowing all around him. 

“Go to sleep,” Gabe’s voice whispered. 

Tyson pressed his cheek against Gabe’s shoulder and let his eyes close again. His eyes didn’t want to stay closed—if he lost sight of Gabe’s glow, if he fell asleep unaware in Gabe’s arms, maybe Gabe wouldn’t be there anymore. It was the kind of late night thought that made him tense, but made Gabe rub a hand up and down his back in a way that Gabe hadn’t learned from him. 

“Are you real?” Tyson asked. “Am I sick? Did I already die?”

“No, Tyson.”

“Okay,” Tyson said. “I believe you.”

Those arms that were Gabe’s, they tightened around Tyson. The hand rubbing soft circles along Tyson’s back, that was still happening. There was a kiss pressed to Tyson’s hair, the hair that Gabe liked because he didn’t know better, and because he just liked it. Tyson wanted to say more, ask more questions, demand to speak to a manager who would tell him how he got so lucky and what would be the cost, but he drifted off to sleep before he could. 

*

Traveling with the team, like being among them but not _of_ them, was weird. They all rumbled downstairs to breakfast, cramming together into the elevators like none would come again, then elbowed each other through the breakfast buffet and piled up too many at a table to better yell at each other and steal each other’s food. Tyson kept an arm around Gabe’s waist for most of the proceedings, making sure to shove when guys came by and climbed onto Gabe in order to better yell at Tyson or Nate or literally anyone else. 

“You’re so _possessive_ ,” J.T. yelled across the table, his arm draped around Josty like that was different somehow. “Are you afraid your boyfriend’s gonna like us more than you?”

“Gabe has taste,” Tyson said. That got a _way_ bigger laugh than he would have liked but exactly as much as he expected. “Gabe is normal, I don’t want him to get freaked out every time a two-hundred pound monster drops on his back like that’s normal.”

“No, Tyson,” J.T. replied. “This is the part where you’re like, YEAH, I’M SUPER POSSESSIVE, THIS IS MY MAN AND MINE ALONE, and then do some of that cool boyfriendly stuff, _god_ , do I have to teach you _everything_?”

“You've taught me zero things, so let’s not break that streak.” He winked at J.T. and leaned back in his seat to check on Gabe, his hand resting on Gabe’s shoulder. “You okay?”

“I am,” Gabe said. “I don’t mind the overbearing.”

“The guys’ overbearing or my overbearing?”

Gabe laughed and leaned in to kiss him. “Both,” he said softly.

The guys lost their _shit_ and Gabe turned bright red, not that he could match Tyson for blushing. 

“Did you try the bacon?” Tyson asked. “It’s not like, great bacon, but all bacon’s pretty great.”

“I like it,” Gabe said. “I can understand the fuss about bacon now. I don’t _get it_ , but I understand it.”

“Sure, those aren’t the same. Guess you won’t mind if I—” Tyson tried to steal a piece off Gabe’s plate and laughed when Gabe wasn’t having it. 

Sharing meals with the guys was probably the most normal thing in Tyson’s life at any given moment, but piling into the bus with all of them and Gabe to head over for morning practice that Tyson wouldn’t be participating in, _that_ was weird. He would work out, get checked out by the trainers and therapists while the guys were actually practicing, then get some time on the ice with the scratches and the other injured guys because… because he missed ice. He missed skating. He couldn’t push himself as hard as the healthy scratches, but any time on the ice helped his mood and his state of mind tremendously. 

But now there was Gabe. Gabe, who wandered around the gym with his crutches and tried very, very hard to look like he understood what all this equipment was for, like the athlete-shaped body he had wasn’t literally crafted for him as magic flung him through space, time, and physical forms of matter and into Tyson’s lap. 

“Hey, let’s get your leg checked out,” Tyson said. “You know, while I’m getting my leg checked out.”

“No, that’s all right,” Gabe said. “It hurts less, actually, it’s fine.”

Tyson made a face and Gabe made one right back. 

“That’s exactly when you’re supposed to get your leg checked out,” Tyson said. “You feel a little bit better, you put a little too much weight on it, you set back all your progress. You shouldn’t be putting any weight on it, actually. I saw you leave the crutches behind to get to the bathroom this morning, like, you shouldn’t be hopping on it without the crutches.” 

Gabe still looked deeply suspicious, but let Tyson lead him to the suite in the arena where the trainers were setting their shit up. 

“Hey, random question,” Tyson announced. “Uh, could someone check out Gabe’s leg? You know, while he’s here.”

One of the trainers, Casey, actually gasped, then looked excited. “An x-ray this early in the day?! Everything’s coming up me!”

Tyson narrowed his eyes at them. “I don’t know how sarcastic you’re being right now.”

“This isn’t sarcasm! Ducks’ management really splurged on their mobile x-ray because they use it so often. Meanwhile, I’ve been begging for an upgrade at the practice arena for at least a year,” Casey replied. “Be right back. Just get your guy up on that table and get his pants off.” 

“Um,” Gabe said.

“No funny business, Tyson!” Casey called, halfway out the door. 

“Yeah, you heard them, no funny business,” Tyson said. 

“Funny business? I would never.”

“Couldn’t even shower without funny business, _Gabriel_.”

“You didn’t _have_ to take your clothes off,” Gabe replied. 

“I did! I would have gotten them all wet!” 

Gabe smirked to himself and did as he was told, taking off his pants most of the way and letting Tyson do the rest. Tyson nicely folded Gabe’s pants and tried not to stare at Gabe in his briefs, but then Gabe needed his help keeping his balance as he got himself up on the table. 

“Your leg really doesn’t hurt?” Tyson asked, standing between Gabe’s legs because where else was he going to stand? Let him die between those thighs. 

“It’s itchy,” Gabe said. “And… sore, I think. Like I could use a good stretch.”

“But it doesn’t hurt like when you broke it,” Tyson said.

“No, no. It hasn’t hurt like that since—”

“Did we cure it with sex magic?” Tyson asked, grinning.

Gabe’s eyes lit up. “Did we? Is your knee—”

“Nah, my knee’s still fucked up,” Tyson said. “I was joking. That’s not a thing we have.”

“Neither do I. I’m not magic, you know.” Gabe sounded sad, almost embarrassed. “I don’t—you know, there’s no granting wishes, no flying, no talking to animals. I asked Henry how he was doing and he stared at me. The dog _and_ Nate.” 

“Gabe,” Tyson said. “You literally fell from space. That’s… kinda magic.”

“That was a one-time thing,” Gabe said. “I’m here now, I don’t—” Gabe looked down at his cast, then at Tyson. He still couldn’t quite meet Tyson’s eyes, though. “Are you sure your leg doesn’t feel better?”

Tyson opened his mouth to say something else, but then Casey came back with one of the Ducks’ medical people and headed directly to the mobile x-ray behemoth that was sitting next to Gabe. A couple of lead aprons were draped over Gabe and Gabe looked over at Tyson, then reached out for his hand. However, Casey tucked Gabe’s arm back under the apron and dragged Tyson outside the room to actually run the machine. Tyson dashed right back in as soon as the thing stopped humming and beeping and lifted the apron so he could hold Gabe’s hand, his thumb stroking Gabe’s palm.

Gabe didn’t sit up again right away after Casey took took the aprons off; he turned his head towards Tyson and Tyson was struck at how he looked genuinely scared. He leaned in close to whisper, “You know space is like, full of radiation. You probably ate that stuff for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.”

Gabe laughed softly, then shook his head. “No, it’s not—really, Tyson? The radiation?”

“I don’t know, man, you—”

“Uh,” Casey interrupted. “Gabe? Your leg is… fine.”

“What?” Tyson asked. 

“Yeah,” Casey said. “That is one extremely healed, get-the-cast-off-that-thing leg.” They turned around and pointed to the freshly developed x-ray of Gabe’s leg. “I’m not a radiologist—we just use this so we can see broken or not-broken, right? And this is super not broken. Not healing. Already healed. I can only just see the fracture anymore.” Casey raised their eyebrows at Gabe. “How many weeks ago did you break that leg? Did you see a doctor for a checkup before you left Sweden?”

“I… don’t remember, honestly,” Gabe said tentatively. “I think we—you know, I was in such a rush to come over and then the accident happened—”

“Yeah, I don’t think I heard,” Casey said. “What kind of accident?”

“A fall,” Gabe replied. “But it was weeks ago, and—”

“The way he described it sounded bad,” Tyson interrupted. “And, yeah, I was so desperate for him to come over I said that we’d see my guy when he was over here. I figured he still had another week of the cast before we could even check.”

Casey didn’t buy it, exactly, but what were they going to do? They seemed to realize that as their eyes flicked from Tyson to Gabe and back to Tyson. 

“Okay, well. That’s great, I guess. I mean, bad, because if it wasn’t healing well and you let it get to that point, poor Gabe would have been in trouble, so.” Casey wagged a finger at Tyson. “Don’t do that again! Take care of your partner!”

“Right, of course,” Tyson said. 

“And you, buddy,” Casey said to Gabe, who was now more terrified talking to Casey than he had been of the x-ray. “Make sure to remind this big lug to take you to an orthopedist and get this cast off, okay? Actually, you can probably do that, like, _today_ , while practice is happening. Call a car and go get that thing taken off, and then we can work with you to get your leg all crazy buff again.” Casey turned away and hunted for an envelope to stash the films for Tyson. 

Tyson glanced at Gabe, who was staring at Tyson. He still looked worried. Without really thinking, Tyson leaned in and brushed the hair from Gabe’s forehead so he could drop a kiss there. He stepped back to see if it helped, then kissed Gabe’s lips when it didn’t. 

“I’m sorry,” Gabe said.

“For what?”

“I’m leaving these here!” Casey said, holding up the envelope with “GABE” written across the front and, in smaller letters, “BARRIE?” They hustled out of the room, hopefully to give them privacy and not to gossip with everyone and their mom about Tyson’s magical healing boyfriend, who still looked like he wanted to bolt from the table and the world.

“Yeah, thanks,” Tyson called out, but his eyes didn’t waver. “Gabe. What are you talking about?”

“I’m not magic,” Gabe whispered. “Except, I am, because my leg is fine, but yours—”

“Is that why—”

“I know you didn’t want to give me to Nate anymore, but if you kept me so that I—”

“No no no no no no, one million _billion_ times no,” Tyson said. He clutched Gabe’s hand tighter, then loosened his grip because he didn’t want to scare Gabe. “No. _No_! Did I—why would you think that?”

“Tyson, I don’t know, I’ve never—”

“Did I do something?” Tyson asked. “To make you think that I—Gabe, seriously?”

Gabe stared at Tyson for a beat, then pushed himself up so he was sitting upright. Tyson came around to the end of the exam table to stand between Gabe’s legs again. 

“I’m serious,” Tyson said. “I’m not mad, but did I say or do something to make you think I was keeping you around to see if, like, you were gonna heal me forever?”

“You joked about it the night we met,” Gabe said. He stared down at his hands, his fingers linked tightly together, pressing the pads of this thumbs together until Tyson covered Gabe’s hands with his own to make him relax. “Asking me if I had magic for any permanently injured athletes. I didn’t realize it was you until later, and I was already with you, in your house.”

“I’m so sorry,” Tyson said immediately. “Gabe? Are you listening? I was joking, I made a really stupid joke and I’m so sorry. I never really thought that, not for a minute, and I’m sorry, I’m _so sorry_ if I did anything anything to make you think I did.”

“No, I didn’t think you believed it,” Gabe said. He was getting choked up and, in turn, _Tyson_ was getting all choked up because, fuck, Gabe had fallen from space and he had fallen for Gabe, just as hard and just as stupidly fast. “But I still—I hoped, a little. That I could help you. That I could do something for you.”

“Like make me laugh? Make me happy?” Tyson asked. “I gotta tell you, man, before you showed up I was not the cheerful lump of shit you see before you. I haven’t—” Tyson bit his lip and tried to talk around the thickness that had formed in his throat. “This has been the first week in such a long time that I’ve felt like myself. Like who I was before my knee, before I retired, before that insane night I met you. Hey.” 

Tyson leaned up and brushed his thumb against Gabe’s cheek. His beard was so stupidly soft against Tyson’s palm, Tyson thought. He didn’t know how he lived before without knowing that, without knowing Gabe. 

Actually, he knew exactly how he had lived: months full of pain and disappointment; years of worrying himself sick and pushing himself because if he wasn’t good enough for the team then he wasn’t good enough to live; a whole life working towards one thing that he did and he loved and he was _really fucking good at_ for ten years and would miss for the rest of his life. He wouldn’t take a single day back because then he wouldn’t be Tyson Barrie, but neither did he want to give up a single day in a future with Gabe. 

“You think you’re not magic? Okay, maybe you’re not. But you’re not what I expected. You’re so much better than that, Gabe.”

Gabe nodded. He looked so tentative, like he didn’t quite believe Tyson, and Tyson didn’t know what to do for that. 

“You ready to put some pants on and go get your cast off?”

“Can you just—” Tyson took a breath, expecting Gabe to ask him to leave him alone for a while, let him process things which, sure, Gabe absolutely needed to do that, but Tyson was genuinely, mortally afraid that if he took his eyes off Gabe, he would sprint off in a thigh-high purple cast and it might take like, two or three entire minutes to track him down again, and find a way to make him believe that Tyson—

Fuck, was this love? Tyson probably loved him. This was probably love, when already the thought of losing Gabe, his bitchiness and his joy and the easy way they touched and looked at each other, put a deep bone-chilling fear into his body. 

It probably should have been more terrifying. Shouldn't it?

As Tyson waited and worried, Gabe leaned in and enveloped Tyson in his arms. It was awkward, Gabe a fucking giant sitting above Tyson on the exam table with one leg immobilized. It didn't matter; he wrapped up Tyson in his arms and hugged him close, pressing his face to Tyson’s hair and breathing him in with shallow, shaky breaths. Tyson pressed his face against Gabe’s chest, his new favorite spot on the entire planet, and he wrapped his arms tight around Gabe, too.

“I don’t want you to go, okay?” Tyson mumbled against Gabe’s chest. “I like you so much. I know, I’m not like, great with words or whatever—”

“You’re pretty okay.”

“Glowing praise from a star,” Tyson said. “I’ll never do better than that.”

Gabe laughed and hugged him tighter, and Tyson irrationally hoped he would never let go.

*

They spent the rest of their first road trip like this:

In Anaheim, they had Gabe x-rayed, examined, awarded a clean bill of health, and finally had the cast cut off his leg. 

Gabe made a face when he saw his slightly atrophied and gross-smelling leg again for the first time in a week, but Tyson assured him that it was only temporary and his leg would be clean and attractive in no time.

“That’s not a leg that’s been in a cast for weeks,” the doctor noted, leaning in too close for both Gabe and Tyson’s comfort.

“He must be a super quick healer, huh?” Tyson suggested.

“No… I mean…”

“Doctor,” Gabe interrupted. “Does this also mean we’re cleared for gay athletic sex? Immediately?” 

The doctor short circuited, advised them to take it easy for another day or two, and sent them off on their way.

“Uh, where’d you learn that little trick?” Tyson laughed as they climbed into another Uber.

“Who do you think?” Gabe asked. “Not like Nate has been throwing sex into people’s faces to distract them and escape from uncomfortable situations since I got here.”

“Yeah,” Tyson sighed. “Canada's questioning my citizenship because I'm too gay and shameless for my people.” 

Gabe laughed and held Tyson’s hand as they drove back to the team hotel for a meal and a nap and whatever else Gabe wanted to do with his newly freed leg. 

In Los Angeles, Tyson got in a work out while he watched the trainers show Gabe the basics of stretching without absolutely fucking his newly healed shit up. Then, while the team was off reviewing video, Tyson kneeled in front of Gabe in the changing room and laced up Gabe’s first pair of ice skates. 

“I think I can figure this out, I _have_ been wearing shoes since I arrived,” Gabe said. He didn’t bat away Tyson’s hands from his ankles, so maybe he didn’t mind all that much. Gabe bumped his knee against the side of Tyson’s head and gave him a little smile, which made Tyson blush and hustle a little in tying Gabe’s skates. 

“Well, you can speed it all up by putting some pads on.”

“Do I need pads?” Gabe asked, looking at the shin pads and elbow pads sitting in a pile near his feet. “It’s just skating, I’ve _watched_ normal people skate, it’s only you professionals destroying each other that need pads for skating.”

“Maybe I want to cut down on the complaining if you stumble and fall,” Tyson said. 

“Wait, you didn’t get me the pants you wear,” Gabe said. “I want the little shorts.”

“What little—the pants?”

“Yeah! I want the pants!”

“Like, to wear over your jeans and your pads? Ugh, okay, I’ll go find you some stupid hockey pants.”

“The _stupidest_ ,” Gabe said, invoking it like a promise Tyson had to keep.

Tyson had been to enough heart-wrenching family skates to know how first skates were supposed to go… with babies. There was the proud dad taking his infant blob out onto the ice and showing them off, then there was the proud dad putting stupidly tiny little baby skates on his toddler blob and guiding them out on the ice, and so on and so forth until snotty preteens were giving Tyson flashbacks to minor league hockey and Tyson had to excuse himself to talk to some food about the whole situation.

“Okay, so the secret to skating,” Tyson said as Gabe stood at the door to the ice, watching Tyson intently. “Stopping is the hardest part.”

“Because of the laws of motion,” Gabe said. “I’ll move at a constant rate until I’m acted on by a force, and when that body exerts a force—”

“Stop, you’re hot and confusing,” Tyson said. “I have a high school education and it wasn’t a very good one.”

Gabe nodded, but still didn’t take a step out onto the ice. 

“Will this hurt your leg?” Gabe asked after another moment. “Doing this for me?”

“What, skating? Nah. Well, that’s why you’ve got the pads on—not just because falling sucks, but if I tweak my knee, I’ll probably end up letting you fall on your ass so I don’t fuck something up again.”

“Okay,” Gabe said. “So what if I say, great skate, and we go back to the changing room and forget this ever happened?”

“Okay,” Tyson said.

Gabe looked up from his current nemesis, the sheet of ice at the Staples Center, and raised his eyebrows at Tyson. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Tyson said. “You don’t have to skate just because I skate. It’s your thing or it’s not.”

“And you’d—it would be okay with you if I never touched another skate again and never stepped out onto a sheet of ice ever in my life, even though you love skating more than anything?”

Tyson thought about it, then said, “Yep.” Gabe still look confused, so Tyson skated in a small circle and stopped in front of Gabe with a big old shrug. “Look, I love skating enough for both of us. I love skating enough for probably a thousand random people on the planet who have never and will never skate in their lives. If you’re one of them? That’s fine. I promise. It’s up to you. You’re the only one who can step onto that ice, okay? I’ll never think less of you for that.”

Gabe stared at Tyson, then held out his hand. Tyson took his hand and let Gabe hold on as he stepped onto the ice, one foot then the other. 

“Oh, wait, get back up there,” Tyson said. “Let me show you how to fall and minimize hurting yourself.” Gabe laughed and held on to the edge by the door, watched Tyson’s demonstrations, and then grinned when Tyson held out his hand again. “ _Now_ we can skate.”

“You’re not going to push me or anything so you can see if I was paying attention to falling?”

“No! Oh my god, Gabe, I promise!” Tyson really had to wonder how awful humans looked from a billion miles away if Gabe's every first thought was that someone wanted to cause him pain. Fuck, people were the worst. 

Tyson, honestly, hadn’t been with a first-time skater on the ice since he was a kid. Maybe since he was a teenager and some stupid romcoms had tried to suggest that girls would be incredibly taken by the cute guy with curls who would take them by the hand and twirl them around the ice and Maroon 5 or that Hoobastank song would be playing and he wouldn’t be a loser for once in his life. Teen Tyson had to appreciate that Adult Tyson had moved up in the world considerably, and this was better than any sweaty braces-fueled daydreams of his mistakenly hetero youth. 

“What are you thinking about?” Gabe asked. “You haven’t given me advice on how to stay alive while skating in at least three minutes.”

“And you’ve done a great job!” Tyson said. “I should shut up forever.”

“No, don’t,” Gabe laughed. “Are you having fun?”

“Are _you_?” Deflection wasn’t a good look on him, according to Gabe's raised eyebrows, so Tyson took a deep breath and adjusted his grip on Gabe’s hand. “I was just thinking about this: holding hands with a really cute guy, showing him how to skate, my palm is barely sweaty right now, it’s—I kinda never imagined it would be me, you know?” Then, Tyson waved up at the empty arena around them. “And I was in the NHL! I’ve played in every NHL arena in North America! I’m skating with a guy on the ice at the _Staples Center_. By the way, the team hasn’t won a game here in, uh, literally forever. The record’s something crazy but this place sucks for us. Get ready for a fucking downer of a hockey game tonight.” Tyson laughed loudly, like he was trying to make his laughter fill the entirety of the arena. “It’s surreal, all of it, you know?”

“So, what I’m hearing is that you think I’m cute,” Gabe said as he squeezed Tyson's hand. 

Tyson laughed even louder, a real laugh this time, and looked up at Gabe. “You like skating so far?”

“Show me how to look less awkward.”

“That’s just practice. Anyway, who cares how you look? Have you _seen_ how you look?”

“I care,” Gabe said, pouting a little. “The guys will probably notice we’re gone any minute and come out here and—”

“Yeah, fuck ‘em,” Tyson said. “Just hold my hand. We’ll be okay.” 

While they skated, Gabe fell all of twice, didn’t lose _any_ of his perfect teeth, pushed himself right back up, and beamed at Tyson every time. 

In Arizona, they had a Thanksgiving dinner, ostensibly for the six American players on the team. The food people for the team were great at their jobs and did try hard to please the athletic dumpsters they managed, so they offered dishes from every player’s country to form an aggressively congenial autumnal potluck when it was T-shirt weather outside. 

“Excuse me, excuse me, I need people to admire my contribution to the potluck suggestion box,” Nate announced as everyone arrived for dinner. High over his head, he held up a huge cornucopia stuffed with packets of ketchup chips, which he then lowered so he could pull out two bags for Tyson and two for himself. 

“This is advanced level junk food, I don’t know if you’re ready,” Tyson said as he held a chip out to Gabe.

“You fed him an extra large Blizzard his second day here, Tys, what the fuck,” Nate replied. “Don’t listen to him, they’re potato chips and they’re the best. And all-dressed. As a people, we took every flavor of chip and just threw blew them up into—”

“Gabe! Meatballs!” Soda called from further down the food buffet. 

“Get super excited about meatballs,” Tyson muttered. “I’m serious, look that excited.”

“Are they made out of a special meat?” Gabe asked as he gave Soda a big thumbs up and a bigger grin. 

“No, they’re meatballs, I dunno, it’s big in Sweden.”

“Is the giant melting cheese good? That looks exciting,” Gabe said. 

“It’s awesome, get in on that shit before it’s gone,” Tyson said. Gabe nodded and politely made a stop at the meatballs and looked very enthusiastic as Soda drowned his plate in gravy and meatballs and lingonberry sauce. While Tyson watched, Nate sidled up and handed him a plate to begin their international gratitude and gluttony tour. 

“So,” Nate said slowly. “I’m here to remind you that I don’t want you to get hurt—”

“—I know—”

“—Because you’re like, really into your fake boyfriend.”

They were apart from the rest of the team, hanging out at the Canadian section of the buffet, which was basically the American section but with a maple glaze on every single thing. Tyson made sure to keep an eye out for eavesdroppers while also looking very interested in evaluating the poutine on offer.

“Yeah, I’m pretty sure I’m in love with him,” Tyson said to Nate, who choked on a Brussels sprout he had nicked from a pan. “It’s bad, and by bad I mean awesome so don’t ruin it.”

“Okay, so we’re headed full-speed into Bad Decision Town?”

“You think Gabe’s gonna hurt me?”

“Not… deliberately,” Nate said slowly. “But he’s, you know.”

“I know.”

“The leg, dude.”

“Yeah.”

“He’s not—”

“I know. I’m—I want to enjoy it while I can, okay? Same as with any relationship. Honestly, this is probably the healthiest relationship I’ve ever had.”

“He fell from space a week ago. Please don’t let that be true.”

“But we’re really into each other and—”

“It’s been a week!”

“It doesn’t feel like it.” 

“Maybe you’re trapped in a time dilation field.”

“Have you been reading about space on wikipedia to learn more about my fake boyfriend’s life as a star?”

“Listen: shut up? Like you haven’t.”

“I’m fucking him, I’m kinda invested in—”

“Whoa, _what_. You guys already—”

“Have you seen him? Would _you_ wait?”

“I thought there were supposed to be tearful confessions about how it was never fake for you, something something, before getting down with a fake boyfriend.”

“The fake boyfriend seems to be really into my dick so again: I’m not questioning it! I’m enjoying the ride!”

“You’re so easy, both sexually and in setting yourself up as the punchline to every joke.”

“That punchline was my American Thanksgiving gift to you, so wow, way to totally reject me. This is why I needed a fake boyfriend.”

“Hey, speaking of,” Nate said suddenly. He took Tyson’s arm firmly and led him away from the buffet and towards a corner of the corporate ballroom hosting their team party. Tyson glanced over his shoulder to catch a glimpse of Gabe, who had already sat down at a table with some of the guys. His arm was stretched over two empty seats next to him, for Tyson and Nate, because _fuck_ he really was the best boyfriend, real or fake, that Tyson could have imagined. 

“Hey, eyes up here,” Nate said, snapping his fingers. “You’re joking about this, but that night you proposed? That night you drove out into the mountains and literally _found an alien_ —”

“Fallen star.”

Nate stared at him with wide eyes for a moment, like he needed Tyson to really hear himself so the facts could sink in, but Tyson wasn’t moved. Everything was pretty fucking sunken in and Tyson knew what he was about. 

“You found a fallen star,” Nate repeated. “I’m glad things are good with him. I’m serious. I’m happy for you, I’m relieved and if you two are good, then that’s awesome. I’m with you, okay? If he’s okay with acting the way he does around you, and whatever you guys do in private, then that’s great. I’m really, really happy for you.”

“But…”

Nate bit the inside of his lip and looked at Tyson. “I was so scared for you that night. And I—that’s the thing, that night wasn’t just one insane night where you kind of lost it and proposed to me and ran away. You haven’t been okay for months and that night I was—Brutes, I thought that was it. I thought I was gonna lose you.” 

It… wasn’t a surprise to Tyson. Maybe Nate didn’t remember the way he had answered Tyson’s call, but Tyson remembered. The desperation in Nate’s voice, the way he didn’t want Tyson to hang up in case it was the last time he heard from him—that was seared into Tyson’s brain and he wouldn’t forget that, not ever. 

“I’m sorry,” Tyson said. “I am. I’m so sorry I made you worry. I’m sorry I haven’t been a good best friend since—”

“It’s my turn, okay?” Nate said. “We’ve looked out for each other all this time and you’ve taken care of me through a bunch of shit, and been my best friend—I just wish you’d let me help before it got to that. Like. A cry for help is a cry for help, just—cry earlier? Louder? Tyson Barrie, I will fucking murder you if you turn that into a sex joke.”

“As long as you know I’m thinking it,” Tyson said weakly.

They stood there for another moment, neither of them quite meeting each other’s eyes. Nate finally sighed and rubbed the back of his neck.

“Can you do that for me? Can we do that for each other?” Nate asked. “If we need help, just fucking ask?”

Tyson nodded, then cleared his throat. “You have to ask sometimes, too. I know you’re all big and Canadian and Cole Harbour boys never cry or whatever—”

“Man, how I ended up with two best friends from the opposite ends of Canada who are actually _exactly the same person_ , I’ll never fucking know.”

“You have a type,” Tyson laughed. “It’s that big honest open face of yours. Also, fuck you, I have _so_ much more personality Sid.”

“God, shut up.” Nate flicked Tyson’s shoulder and looked over at the tables where the guys were sitting. “Come on, let’s get more food before Gabe comes and rescues you.”

“Are we okay?” Tyson asked. 

“Yeah,” Nate said. “Always.”

“We’re okay,” Tyson repeated. “Come on, maybe there’s still some raclette left and we gotta get on that shit before it’s gone.”

“Ugh, Gabe probably got you some,” Nate groaned. “I’m boyfriendless so go sit with him, I’ll get my own.”

Gabe actually did have two small trays of raclette and the requisite dipping vehicles, but he put his hand over the extra when Tyson reached for it.

“That's not for me?”

“It was,” Gabe said. “But then it turned out to be really good, so I’m keeping it.”

“NATE,” Tyson yelled across the room. “CHEESE ME.”

“You’re so needy,” EJ laughed from across the table. 

“I wouldn’t be so needy if the nutritionists listened to my cheese meal proposal. We need cheese _all the time_ , we're growing boys.”

“Sure, that’s what I’m talking about,” EJ said. Nate arrived at that moment with the promised helpings of melty cheese for himself and for Tyson, so obviously it was their turn in the hot seat. “Tys, does Gabe know that he’s always going to compete with Nate in your affections or what?”

“It’s not a competition,” Tyson said, which made everyone laugh, Nate and Gabe included. “What? What’s so funny?”

“I dunno, I just wish we had known about Gabe earlier,” EJ replied. “Like, did Nate ever give him the shovel talk? Should we take this Thanksgiving opportunity to give him the shovel talk?”

Gabe looked around and asked, “What… is that…” 

“You hurt Tyson, we hurt you, and bury you with a shovel,” EJ said. “Hey, Europeans, that’s like, a thing, right?”

“Not really,” Grubi said. “But I’ve seen _Clueless_. It’s a classic.”

“Oh my god, everyone on this team is a _baby_ ,” EJ moaned.

“Can we not threaten my boyfriend with physical violence?” Tyson asked. “He’s so nice and sheltered from toxic bullshit, don't get that shit all over him.”

“I still don’t understand,” Gabe said. “Do we fight each other with the shovels?” Gabe got a good laugh with that and smirked at Tyson. He settled his arm around the back of Tyson’s chair again, making sure to rest his arm along Tyson’s shoulders. Tyson let Gabe pull him in closer. 

“I’m serious, Nate, like, your man’s basically been _married_ for three years and you never had an existential crisis, never cried about how he was gonna leave you, never even flinched,” J.T. said. “I’m kinda impressed. How’d you do it?”

“How’d I become a responsible, mature adult when I spend every day with you guys? _Great_ question,” Nate replied. “Don’t know how I found the strength.”

“But Gabe didn’t live here before,” Josty interrupted. “And now Tyson’s, you know.”

“Can we not,” Tyson interrupted. “It’s Thanksgiving for some people, and sometimes that means something.”

“Like don’t start shit with the #BestFriends,” Nate added. “Gabe’s our third musketeer.”

“Oh, so _he’s_ the third wheel,” EJ said. “Good. To. Know.”

Nate and Tyson both rolled their eyes, which only egged the guys on even more. Tyson allowed himself to look as annoyed as he felt until Gabe pulled him in closer and pressed a kiss against his temple. 

“When I first met Tyson—” A hush fell over the table as Gabe spoke and Tyson looked around because what the _fuck_. EJ was their captain and it was only through aggressive EJness and the threat of being trampled by his horses that he managed to command their rotating cast of idiots. Not Gabe, though. Fuck. “He only mentioned Nate about five or six times that first hour I knew him.”

“Hey,” Tyson said. “I’m not that bad. I was not _that bad_.”

“You are that bad,” Nate said. “You’re worse than my whole family, but that’s why I love you.”

“This is why I have a complex,” Tyson said. “It’s amazing Gabe even looked twice at me.”

Tyson glanced up at Gabe, and Gabe turned to look at him. His smirk turned into a smile, something bright and warm that lit Tyson up from the inside. 

“I saw him and he was the only person for miles,” Gabe said.

Tyson put the pieces together and shook his head. “You’re such a fucker.”

“Oh, am I lying, Tyson?”

“You are not, _Gabriel_. I take it back.”

“Take what back?”

“I take _everything_ back.”

“No take-backs,” Nate said. “He’s yours, Gabe. I need time to like, develop hobbies again.” 

“All right, attention everyone, I’m now holding auditions for a new best friend and a new boyfriend, please submit applications to—”

“Oh hell no, we have _jobs_ ,” J.T. said. “Some of us even have lives outside of our jobs.”

Tyson looked at Gabe again. “Guess you’re stuck with me.”

“Guess so,” Gabe agreed. That smile was back, warm with a hint of shit-eating smugness. Tyson couldn’t help smile back before he leaned in to kiss Gabe, earning a dinner roll to the face for his efforts.

“Good, now I don’t have to get one of my own,” Tyson said before he crammed the dinner roll all into his mouth.

“Well, now I get what Gabe sees in his mouth,” Josty said.

Tyson choked and yelled at EJ, “You’re gonna let our new baby son talk like that?”

“Yeah,” EJ said. “It’s hilarious.”

“Fuck everyone at this table,” Tyson said. 

“Move away from Gabe so we can throw more food at you,” Kerfy called out. “We like him more than you, we don’t want him to get hurt.”

Tyson shook his head and stole Gabe’s raclette. The stomachache from chugging two portions of liquid cheese destroyed him later that night, but Tyson couldn't bring himself to regret his decisions.

*

The morning they were supposed to leave for the team’s 36 hours in Nashville, Tyson woke up in his bed. He was in the master bedroom of his house with Gabe curled up around him, their legs tangled together, Gabe’s arm wrapped around Tyson’s chest, his hand firmly keeping Tyson in place as he slept. It felt like Gabe had his forehead pressed to the nape of Tyson’s neck and all of it, just as he woke up, felt so warm and overwhelming. Tyson tried to close his eyes and fall back asleep, but Gabe was starting to wake up, too.

“Do we have to fly today?” Gabe asked Tyson’s neck. “Do they need you in Nashville?”

Huh. There was an idea. 

“Make me a counteroffer,” Tyson said.

“Do you need more than this?” Gabe asked. He was definitely nuzzling Tyson’s hair, the fucker.

“Ugh, you’re right. I’m so fucking easy.”

“People keep saying that, _you_ keep saying that. Is that bad?”

“I mean, it’s bad when I’m so desperate to get laid that I kinda don’t vet my dates enough.”

Gabe let go of Tyson and urged him onto his back, the better for Gabe to lean his motherfucking _heavy_ chest on Tyson and look down at him. It felt awesome but christ, Gabe was a tank. “Tyson,” he said carefully. “Who did you vet _less_ than a stranger you found in a crater?”

“Okay, look, when you say it like that—”

The main objective for their couple of days alone, away from the team, was to take Gabe shopping for all the shit he needed to build a life: clothes, a computer, a phone, more clothes, and a quick stop at the local drugstore to get some passport photos taken to use on the slightly forged government papers that would officially let Gabe exist on the planet as his own person. Tyson didn’t mention that part to Gabe until they were already back in Tyson’s bedroom and Gabe was examining his own ass in the new jeans he had chosen. 

“How do you know any forgers?”

“Weirdly enough, the team hooked me up after bribing chartered flight security in every airport we’ve flown through,” Tyson said. “How do _they_ know any forgers? I don’t care. I just have to send them your new passport photos and you’ll eventually have a Swedish passport and visa of your very own.” 

“Can I see what kind of identity you’re building for me?” Gabe asked. 

“Uhhhh, sure,” Tyson said. “I mean, if any of us are going to prison, it’s definitely me, and good luck deporting you somewhere when you literally came from space.” 

Tyson had dragged his laptop into bed, so Gabe joined him, his long legs in his new way-too-tight jeans stretched out for miles next to Tyson’s. God, Tyson was an idiot, and he was an idiot who knew how good they looked together. _Fuck_. He cleared his throat, though, and showed Gabe the paperwork the team had uploaded to some secure file sharing site. 

“Stockholm, okay, we’re really leaning into the Swedish thing,” Gabe said. “I can manage that. How old is 25?”

“...what do you mean, how old is 25?”

“Why am I two years younger than you? Also, does that make a difference in our developmental milestones?”

Tyson stared at him for a moment, then said, “No, uh, not right now. Maybe when I was teething and you were still a fetus, but nah, two years is nothing. And the birthdate is from the Swedish register or something, that’s how someone explained it to me. There was a real Gabriel Landeskog, but he died young.”

“Oh,” Gabe said. “Well.” 

“And hey, it was just your birthday,” Tyson said. “Happy birthday! That’s what I told the team—we wanted to celebrate your birthday together for the first time.” 

“Good thinking,” Gabe said. “I wonder if I’ll ever die.”

“Holy shit, Gabe.” 

“It’s a valid question! I landed here and broke my leg, so I _can_ get hurt, but I heal extraordinarily fast. Am I going to die one day? What if my super healing is actually super _aging_ and I only have five years on Earth?”

“Can! We! Not!” Tyson interrupted. “I understand these are super important questions but like—” Tyson sighed and closed his laptop. He rubbed at his eyes because, in those rare moments when Gabe wasn’t laughing at his jokes and kissing him and perfecting the art of sexually destroying Tyson and looking at him like _Tyson_ was the magical one who fell from space and changed his life, these were all the questions Tyson had been asking himself and refusing to answer. If _Gabe_ asked? What the fuck was he going to tell Gabe?

That was when Tyson felt Gabe wrapping his arms around him, both arms firmly pulling Tyson to Gabe. There was a gentle kiss pressed against his hair and, god, fuck, Tyson was fucking ruined for everyone else on the planet. He pulled away from Gabe, shoved his computer further down towards the foot of the bed, then turned around so he could properly wrap himself up in Gabe’s arms and hide his face against Gabe’s neck. He took a deep breath and smelled his own products and also _Gabe_ , who Tyson expected was made of some crazy otherworldly star stuff and would smell differently, but—no. He had his own unique human smell, something addicting that lingered on the pillows when he climbed out of bed and something that tickled Tyson’s nose when they were watching TV too close on the couch. 

Tyson slowly pulled away from Gabe, the better to Actually Talk. He held Gabe’s hand, then covered their hands with his other one. 

“Yeah, that’s kinda the design,” Tyson said. “We can go at any time. You’re here and the return flight just… isn’t scheduled. You can take off whenever.”

“I know, but it’s different for me, isn’t it? It’s—”

“It’s not,” Tyson said. “You said it yourself, you can get hurt, right? And you can super-heal. Cool, great. But you’re still kinda human, so you’re still gonna go one day.”

Gabe opened his mouth like he was going to argue something else, but then he pressed his lips together again. What the _fuck_ was Tyson’s life? Also, why was he not terrible at this? Nate might be proud, after he had finished screaming into his hands because Nate could appreciate the absurd and the horrifying and the full spectrum of human emotion. Tyson did things and Nate felt things. Gabe? It was hard to say what camp he fell into, having been alive less than two weeks and having learned everything and nothing about humans by watching them from a distance of however billion miles. 

“Are you okay?” Tyson asked.

“No, not really,” Gabe said. “I don’t like that, but. As you said. Nothing I can do.”

“Yeah,” Tyson said. “Nate’s good at this stuff, though, you should talk to him. He’s good at feelings. He’d probably say something like, yeah just feel them. And my therapist is always telling me to sit with my feelings before I go do something stupid but wow, that’s _boring_.”

Gabe nodded, then leaned in close to Tyson so he could rest his head on Tyson’s chest and let Tyson hold him. 

“Did you love hockey?” Gabe asked. “I know you said you loved skating, but did you love hockey?”

Tyson thought about it because it had been literally decades since anyone had asked him about the defining feature of his life. Did he love hockey? Of course he did, but did he _love_ it? 

“Yeah,” Tyson said. “I still do. It’s why you’ve gotta pry the remote out of my hands and put something else on, or we’ll watch hockey all night. It’s why…”

“Why you did want to go to Nashville with the team,” Gabe said. 

Tyson cleared his throat because, well, hockey was complicated. 

“It’s why management cleared me to do this insane thing, you know, traveling with the team, bringing my fake boyfriend along, even though I’m retired. My therapist wrote them a letter asking them to approve it, that it was detrimental to my mental health when I retired last season and suddenly I was totally alone—no nearby family, my social support system kinda decimated, and—it’s all a big mess, but yeah, I do love hockey. I've loved it with my whole life. I miss it every day. My therapist had been threatening to write the letter forever, but then you showed up and—you seemed like a good reason to do it. Show you some of North America, introduce you to some people besides me and Nate and Nate’s dog.” 

“Was it that bad, retirement?”

Tyson held his breath for too long, then slowly exhaled. “Yeah. For me, it was that bad. I spent part of the summer with my parents, but that didn’t help. The rest, I stayed with Nate and a couple of friends, traveling and training, getting my leg better again, and that helped, but then the season started up again and I was here and I was alone again.” Tyson took another deep breath and laughed, a short bark of a laugh that brought tears to his eyes. “I’ve never known a life without hockey, without a team and a schedule and a routine, and I thought—I used to think that when I retired, I’d have a family to lean back on, my own family.”

Gabe’s head was still on Tyson’s chest, his arm wrapped around Tyson and his thumb stroking the edge above Tyson’s hip. 

“I do love hockey. I just wish it would have loved me a little longer.” Tyson craned his neck a little to try and see Gabe’s face. Gabe pressed his thumb into the soft skin above Tyson’s hip and Tyson laughed because he was still ticklish there, somehow, after all these years. “I wanted to see if you were still thinking about death, _god_. Didn’t my sadness distract you enough?”

“I’m thinking about a lot of things,” Gabe said patiently. “Sometimes I did think, as a star, that it would be fun to become a person and live a life and have a story, and then that whole _death_ thing, well that was just the perfect ending on top of a perfect life. A lot of stories here end like that.”

“Oh, boy,” Tyson laughed. “Yeah. That’s. We all think that.”

Gabe looked up at Tyson. “You do?”

“Oh, yeah. For sure. Mine had a lot more hockey in it: play in juniors, play at Worlds, play for the NHL, play at the Olympics, win _everything_. Olympic gold medals, the Stanley Cup at least three times, that weird squat trophy they have at Worlds—you get the theme here. And I’d have my family and friends and a partner and a house and a dog, and… then you wait for those things and they never come, but that’s life, you know? And the end’s just the end. I’ve always felt it was like settling up your tab at the end of the night, looking at this long fucking receipt like, _Aw, shit, this is everything I got? Well, we had a good time, it was worth it_. Then you go.”

Tyson sat back against his pillows and the headboard, his fingers carding through Gabe’s hair. “Now’s a good time to mention you’re actually the angel of death and I said all the right things and we get to date for all eternity out in the void.”

Gabe laughed and looked up at Tyson again. “You think that much of me?”

“Eh, what do I know?” 

“I mean, you—do you want to date me for real? You’ll stop calling me your fake boyfriend in front of Nate every chance you’ll get?”

“Oh,” Tyson said. “I… yeah. I mean. Do _you_ want that? You kinda just got here, like, to the planet. I get if you want to do a boyfriend dry run on me before going out to find the real thing.”

It was Gabe’s turn to sigh. “Tyson. You’re an idiot.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“I still want to date you, though.”

Tyson smiled to himself. “Me too.”

“You still want to date you? What a relief.”

Tyson tugged gently at a lock of Gabe’s hair, then smiled down at Gabe. “Yeah, okay, let’s date for real, you jerk.” 

Gabe beamed at him, his skin glowing again like it was evening. It was almost too much for Tyson to look at, but he leaned down and pressed a kiss to Gabe’s lips all the same. It was so nice for Gabe to feel good things and nice things, and share them with Tyson. When Gabe finally got his life together and left him, it would be the thing Tyson missed the most.


	3. Chapter 3

Gabe was fascinated by the dishwasher. It was so useful as an appliance when people insisted on using so many things to cook meals and also to eat them, but he was equally fascinated at how fucking stupid it was that it had to be loaded _and_ unloaded after every use.

"Are you sure you don't want me to do it?" Tyson called from the living room. He was worrying his phone between his hands because for the first time in his entire life, he kinda wanted to load the fucking dishwasher. He was almost desperate enough to do the dishes by hand—not quite there yet, but almost.

"No, I want to do it," Gabe said. "I don't want filth to win."

"That's not what you said this morning."

Tyson looked up and jumped, because Gabe was standing at the entrance to the kitchen, a giant sauté pan in his hand and his eyebrows raised up to his hairline. 

"Can this go in the dishwasher? Will this _please_ the dishwasher?" 

"Maybe top shelf, if you get creative with the glasses."

Gabe nodded, but didn't leave. "Are you all right? That person on TV has really attractive forearms and you're not drooling at all."

Tyson looked at the TV and sputtered a little. "Ted Allen? Yeah, uh. No, it's okay, I'm just—" Tyson stood up and held up his phone. "I'm gonna go into the study and call my parents. Put on whatever you want. Scream if the dishwasher wrongs you."

"Is everything all right?" Gabe asked.

Tyson opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again. "It's complicated?"

Gabe watched him for another beat, then nodded. "Tell me about it later."

"Sure," Tyson said. "And now that I've said yeah, I'll talk to you about it, my weekly call home is probably gonna go perfectly and I'll have nothing to complain about."

"Well, let's hope so," Gabe said, then caught himself and looked stricken. "Not that—you don't complain a lot! I don't mean that! I just—"

"Yeah, I know," Tyson said. "You're sweeter than you think."

Gabe looked touched by that, even wielding the sauté pan in his hand. "Come here," Gabe said, and Tyson went. 

Gabe kissed him, a peck on the lips, then something more that lingered. He pulled away, then kissed Tyson again. 

"If it's really that bad, I'll make you forget," Gabe whispered.

"Oh? How?" 

Gabe shrugged and kissed him again. "I heard from someone, this man with curly hair and sweet brown eyes who was riding me earlier today, that my dick is _bomb_."

Tyson burst out laughing and kissed Gabe again. "Okay, I'll make it quick. Stop putting those thoughts in my head when I'm about to call my family!"

"Putting them in your head implies they left at some point, and if they did, I'm not an effective boyfriend, am I?"

Tyson knew an embarrassing red blush was creeping up his face, so he leaned in for another kiss and left for the study. 

The study in his house was a weird room, considering he didn't really... work, as such. There was a sofa, a desk, and amazing bookshelves lining the walls that were about 40% books and 60% random knickknacks or awards. He looked between the chair behind the desk or the sofa, then went for the chair, even if that meant he wouldn't have any throw pillows for smothering his screams. He gave himself another minute before he finally pressed a button on his phone and dialed home. 

"Tyson! Your father was just about to call you—he wants to know if he's still invited to the fathers' trip when you're technically retired but not retired."

"Hi Mom, nice to hear from you, too. I'm _retired_ retired. The dads' trip is for active players only."

"But you're still traveling with the team! Have they offered you a job to keep you? You never talk to us about what's going on in your life. Anyway, the fathers' trip is for players _and_ staff, remember, and your father loves to see everyone when—"

"Mom, I'm retired. I'm not a player or staff. I'm... I'm just here, okay?"

"But then how are you traveling with the team? I know you're not just following them around on commercial, we see you _on_ the plane with—"

"Hey, Mom? I'm living with someone now. His name is Gabriel, he's from Sweden, we met a few years ago and we've been in an on-again/off-again thing until a few weeks ago when he moved to Denver and now we're living together."

There was a beat. Just as Tyson lifted his phone to make sure the call was still connected, his mom came back. 

" _What_? Tyson! You're _living_ with someone? Hold on, let me get your father."

"No, it's—"

"LEN. TYSON'S LIVING WITH SOMEONE. YES, WITH A MAN."

"Holy shit, Mom."

"Hold on, I'll put you on speakerphone."

"Mom? Is that—do you have to do that? Is it really the end of the world?"

"Baby, we never thought it would happen! And I know you hate telling us _anything_ about your life, so tell us the whole story and then we'll never ask you about it again."

"Oh, great."

"What? What's that tone for? Is that why you're calling? Do you think you made a mistake with Gabriel? Do you want our help in getting him out? What's his last name, we can do a background check on him. Your father knows that investigator—"

"Tyson? You're living with someone? You were _dating_ someone? When the hell did you start dating someone?"

"Yes, Dad! I was dating someone and now I'm living with them! His name is Gabe!"

"Does he prefer Gabriel or Gabe?" his mom asked. "Len, I'm worried. Tyson doesn't sound happy. This boy just moved in with him and he doesn't sound right at all."

"I'm really happy!" Tyson yelled into the phone. "It's been REALLY GREAT having him in my house, I promise!"

Tyson's phone buzzed. He pulled his phone away and found a text from his sister, Victoria: _LOL YOU FUCKING LESBIAN OF COURSE YOU MOVED IN WITH YOUR GIRLFRIEND YOU BARELY KNOW!!!!!!!!_

"You told Victoria?" Tyson asked his parents. "Come on! I hadn't told her yet!"

"You hadn't told your sister?" his mom asked.

"Tyson, why are you hiding this boy from us? From your family? Is that why you're calling? Is he some kind of smuggler or embezzler?"

"You think I called you to tell you that I moved in with my boyfriend Gabe, who's a Swedish smuggler or embezzler, and that I'm unhappy with him? Is that what you've picked up from this phone call so far? Jesus Christ, this is why I don't call you! Are you listening to anything I'm saying?"

"Tyson, you never tell us anything!"

"You're not listening to what I _am_ telling you!"

"Don't talk to your mother in that tone," his dad said. "Now start from the beginning. Is he here illegally?"

"No, _Dad_! He has a visa and I'm probably going to sponsor him for citizenship." 

"And what's his name again? Gabriel?" his mom asked. "That's a nice name. What does his family do?"

"Uh, he's not close with his family."

"Why not?"

"He's... just not."

"That's not a good reason."

"Sorry, Mom, that's his reason, and don't press it, okay?"

"Are you thinking of doing that, too? Just never speaking to us again now that you have this boyfriend? Nathan would never do that to his family. He introduces all his girlfriends and boyfriends to his parents, even the ones who he knows aren't going to stay for long."

"Well, Mom, that's Nate, that's not me, and also, you don't know him."

"What is that supposed to mean? Is Nate having trouble with his family? Are you boys okay? Does Nate like your boyfriend?"

"I thought you and Nate were, you know," his dad said.

"Dad, you've known Nate for years, you _know_ he's my best friend."

"Doesn't mean he can't be your husband. You two are close as can be, I figured if you were both, you know, maybe you'd make him see the light. Why doesn't he like you like that?"

"It's true, you could do so much worse than Nate, who you've known for _years_ ," his mom said. "And you're both so close to Sidney. Those kinds of connections will get you places when you actually retired."

Tyson took a deep breath and pulled the phone away from his ear. 6 minutes, 34 seconds. _Fuck_.

"Mom? Dad? Focus, okay? Nate and I are friends. Nate thinks Gabe is really solid, and so do the guys on the team. Gabe has been in North America for all of like, three weeks, so just. Chill, okay? I really like him." Tyson took another breath. "And also, I'm _actually_ retired. Please... listen to that, okay? I've retired from hockey. I'm still traveling with the team because I'm—there's still some medical stuff I'm working on with the team doctors, so I got special permission to travel with them. I'm officially retired, okay?"

"It's just such a shame," his mom sighed. "Have you decided what you're going to do yet? Are you coming home soon? We would love to meet Gabriel. You still haven't told us anything about him!"

"I don't know when I'm coming to visit," Tyson said. He could feel his jaw starting to clench, so he closed his eyes and tried to relax. "Gabe's still settling in. I think we're staying in Denver for a while."

"You can move home any time, Tyson," his mom repeated. "We have good doctors up here, too, you know, and lots of young teams that need coaching. Maybe Gabe could find a job, too! Does he have any interests or skills? What did he do in Sweden?"

"We'll talk about it later, okay? I've gotta go."

"You just called!"

"Yeah, I'm sorry, we'll talk more soon, okay?"

"Find out about the father's trip or I'm calling Sakic myself," Tyson's dad said.

"Dad, cut it out! This isn't middle school, you can't just call the principal every time you're mad about something! Just let it go!"

"That was a joke, Tyson. God, you can't say anything to anyone these days."

"Tyson, remember what I said—"

"Yup, I gotta go, have a good night."

Tyson ended the call, then saw more texts from his sister:

_Mom said you've been dating this guy for THREE YEARS??? and you never told me???? you little bitch_

_Did you order him online Tys are you lonely_

_Hahaha jk send me pics I can't wait to meet him!!!!! Text me!!!_

Tyson rolled his eyes. He folded his arms on his desk so he could rest his head for a moment, collect himself before he went back out into the living room and put on his best Totally Human face for Gabe. He would have to tell Gabe, at some point, that talking to his family was like weathering a hurricane of acid, but in a nice way! Everyone loved his family! His dad was charming, his mom was a sweetheart, his sister was effortlessly cool—how could anyone not love his family! 

Tyson barely heard the gentle knock at the door, and barely had time to sit up straight and lift his head up before Gabe was coming inside. 

"Are you okay? Your head was down, did you fall asleep?"

"No. I wish. I dunno." Tyson rubbed a hand down his face and looked up at Gabe, whose eyebrows were furrowed with worry. He suddenly remembered the insane night they met, when Tyson started coughing because he was startled and Gabe stared at him like he was about to dissolve into dust or fall over dead. Tyson put a big, fake smile on his face. "I'm fine."

Gabe's expression didn't change. "Come on," he finally said, holding out a hand for Tyson. "Let's watch TV in bed. Or read. I could eat a book tonight."

"Wait, what?"

"Sorry, devour."

Tyson laughed and stood up. "Yeah, that one." He watched Gabe blush a little, like that was in any way embarrassing rather than _adorable_ , and took Gabe's outstretched hand. "What are you working on?"

"I found a series of novels set during the Napoleonic Wars, but the wars are fought with _dragons_. Giant, sentient dragons that talk. And they have amazing relationships with their captains and their crews—there's whole crews of people using these dragons as aerial battleships during the wars."

"That sounds fucking wild," Tyson said. 

"Good," Gabe said. "So come upstairs with me and play on your phone while I use you as a reading desk."

"You're not gonna... ask..."

The two of them stood at the foot of the stairs, both of them examining each other's expressions and looking for clues. Tyson raised an eyebrow and Gabe cracked a sad smile.

"You raised your voice a lot," Gabe said. "You do that all the time, but not—I don't know. You sounded really angry."

"I was," Tyson said. "I don't... it sucks to say I was really angry, but I think I was really angry."

"Do you want me to say it?" Gabe asked. "Because I've heard you have playful arguments with every single person on the team, probably in the Avalanche organization, on all sorts of stupid shit ranging from breakfast burritos to how long you would last in a zombie apocalypse, and you never sounded _that_ angry."

Tyson considered it and had to admit Gabe was right. "Don't worry about it. I'm forgetting it already."

"All right," Gabe said. "When you want to tell me—"

Tyson nodded. "I'll try to pry you away from your dragon boys."

"I think you would like them!"

"Books are hard."

Gabe smiled. "Hard enough to open up your thick skull once in a while?"

"Hey!"

*

In mid-December, the schedule shifted so that the team wouldn't be traveling every other day; it was, supposedly, smoother sailing from there on out, a few longer trips here and there, but long stretches at home, too. As long as they ever were, anyway. 

The guys had played in St. Louis the night before, so there was only an optional skate for the team the next afternoon. Tyson woke up, Gabe's arm heavy across his stomach, and watched Gabe sleep while he thought about what they should do that day. The weather would be weirdly warm and nice for December, so maybe they could take a drive somewhere and do something outdoorsy. Tyson wasn't an outdoorsy guy, but he couldn't help wonder if Gabe, the natural wonder from space, might be? He should show Gabe a tree or something. The mountains were there. Didn't he keep telling himself he would go see the mountains more often? Maybe it was a mountain day.

"Stop thinking so loud," Gabe mumbled next to him. 

"I'm not," Tyson said. "But now that you're awake: do you like mountains?"

"What?"

"Like, hiking. You wanna hike?"

"Absolutely not."

"What? You've never hiked! What if it's your favorite thing you haven't done yet?"

Gabe opened an eye and glared at Tyson. He reached for Tyson's hand, the one with his ever-present phone in it, and checked the time. "It's 7:15 on a Saturday morning. I promise you, the mountains will still be there later. If they're not, we're in trouble."

"Just asking," Tyson said. "Ooh, maybe swimming. The development has an indoor pool at the gym I never use, maybe we could swim."

"Why are you doing this to me?"

Tyson stilled for a moment, then pulled the comforter closer around them, almost up to his chin. Gabe hummed in agreement, pulling Tyson closer and shoving his thigh between Tyson's, warming them both up and keeping his limbs wrapped tight around Tyson. 

"I don't want you to get bored," Tyson said.

"I'm not bored."

"Not _now_ , but what if you do get bored?"

"I don't know, Tyson. Is boredom so terrible? Would it literally kill me? It makes me sleepy, I didn't know that was fatal."

"You know what I mean."

"I don't. What's wrong with boredom?"

"If you're bored it means I'm boring. You didn't fall to Earth just to be _bored_."

"Or it means I want to sit back and not do much of anything, and maybe you don't have to keep bombarding me with things to make sure I'm entertained. I'm not a child, I'm not going to throw a fit if you don't feed me every three hours and sit me in front of a bright screen with shapes."

"You're _cranky_. You know who gets cranky? People who are bored so they snipe at other people."

"What about people woken up too early by their bedperson suggesting they go climb a fucking mountain before they've even had breakfast, Tyson?"

" _Bedperson_?"

"You're not my boy or my friend if you're not going to let me sleep. Real friends let me sleep as much as I want." Gabe rolled onto his back, prying himself away from Tyson and stretching, arching his back and yawning tremendously before he sank back into the mattress. "It's exhausting being awake in the sunshine all the time. There's just so _much_ of it. Why aren't humans nocturnal? It's so much calmer and quiet at night."

Now was probably not a good time to remind Gabe it was winter, and coming close to the shortest day of the year. If he thought this was too much sunshine, _well_. 

Gabe turned his head and reached out to touch Tyson, stroking his cheek and pushing his curls back. "Sorry. I'm cranky. Not because I'm bored, but because it's _seven in the morning_."

"Weren't you the guy going off about how linear time was bullshit?"

"I've had some time to adjust. It fucking sucks."

Tyson grinned and pulled Gabe in for a kiss. Gabe murmured in agreement and deepened the kiss, pulling Tyson closer and resting his hand on his hip for a moment before sliding into his briefs and grabbing his ass, urging Tyson closer. Gabe rolled onto his back and pulled Tyson with him, cradling him between his legs as they kissed, as Tyson remembered there was so much more of Gabe to kiss and bite, better moans he could get out of Gabe than whether or not it was too early to be awake. 

Tyson threw back the covers and kissed his way down Gabe's body. He still marveled at how strangely unmarked most of Gabe's skin was—he had little moles on his shoulder and down his back, but nothing else. No scars from a poorly supervised childhood, stupid wrestling antics (holy _shit_ so stupid), a life as a professional athlete, no, Gabe was smooth all over and it was beautiful but it was also disarming. Tyson looked up as he sucked another mark on Gabe's stomach before moving down to his hips. Gabe was propped up on his elbows, watching Tyson and breathing heavily like he couldn't believe what he was seeing. Tyson let his eyes close again, slowly, taking his time as he tasted Gabe and pressed his fingers into Gabe's skin. 

"Is this okay?" Tyson asked, his mouth hovering over Gabe's dick, his hand resting on that flat plane just below his stomach. Gabe nodded shakily and Tyson locked eyes with him for another moment before he pressed a kiss to the base of Gabe's dick and took him into his mouth, his hand around the base. It wasn't Gabe's first blowjob (getting or giving, Tyson was trying to be thorough), but Gabe still had a hungry look in his eyes every time Tyson glanced up through his lashes. He knew he could pull Tyson's hair and he tried to, his hand shaking just a little, but it was Gabe's eyes that made Tyson suck harder, lick the tip as Gabe shuddered. 

Gabe whispered Tyson's name almost under his breath, the heel of Tyson's hand pressing on Gabe's stomach to keep him down. Tyson could feel his muscles contracting, like he was holding back and trying to last as long as he could. He spread his legs wider for Tyson, finally throwing his head back and moaning, grasping Tyson's hair and gently fucking into Tyson's mouth. Tyson looked up, hearing Gabe whisper that he was going to come, and the sight of Gabe spread out over him—thighs on either side of him, miles of Gabe's body in front of him, his eyes closed as he came, his mouth red from kissing Tyson and biting his own lip—felt like desire punching him in the dick, his hips rubbing against the sheets for any sort of contact. Gabe shot down his throat, gasping for air above him, his muscles shaking from riding that edge for so long. "Tyson, please," Gabe said, falling back against the pillows and trying to urge Tyson up, like Tyson needed any urging. 

Gabe pulled Tyson close and kissed him, his tongue slipping into Tyson's mouth like was trying to taste every bit of himself and like he could tonguefuck an orgasm out of him. Like, maybe Gabe could, but right now Tyson's dick needed more. They struggled to get Tyson out of his shorts, both of them so desperate and sloppy and laughing at themselves that it did become a two-person job, Gabe holding Tyson's shorts up like a victory flag and laughing before he launched himself against Tyson again. 

"Let me fuck your thighs," Tyson said. He already had the lube in hand, slicking himself up as Gabe pressed his forehead to Tyson's, his breaths hot against Tyson's cheek. He nodded and Tyson kissed him, pressing himself between Gabe's thighs and thrusting between them. Gabe wrapped his arms around Tyson and tightened around Tyson's dick, all of Gabe pressing so hot and hard against Tyson that he couldn't last, grabbing Gabe's ass and coming, shutting his eyes so tight he could see sparks. They stayed like that for another moment, completely wrapped up in each other, until Tyson pulled away a little, his dick too sensitive and Tyson too fucking gone to do anything but breathe against Gabe's shoulder. 

"You don't know how hot you are," Tyson said against him. "How fucking beautiful. Like. All the time. _All the time_."

"Do you?" Gabe asked. His hands were in Tyson's hair, his fingers tight against the longer curls at the back of Tyson's head. "When you look at me like—" Gabe kissed the top of Tyson's head. "Like I'm the best thing you've ever seen."

Tyson laughed to himself, smothering it in Gabe's skin. "Dunno if you've noticed, but."

"I didn't know," Gabe said quietly. "I didn't know you'd be the best thing I could ever see."

Tyson swallowed hard and shook his head. "Come on. You haven't seen the Eiffel Tower yet, or a bucket of raw cookie dough." 

"Yes I have, I know EJ keeps it in his fridge so you can only get to it when you go over to his house for a cookie dough emergency." Tyson laughed because, god, he was kind of a fucking parody of himself, but then Gabe spoke, his voice quiet again. 

"You've been alive this long and no one's looked at you like that before?" Tyson could hear from his voice that he wasn't trying to be mean or sad about it, but faintly astonished. "People are stupid. I'm so lucky. I'm _so lucky_."

Tyson couldn't hear that. He did, but he couldn't. He shut his eyes and pressed his face closer against Gabe, hoping he would use some star magic he didn't have and like, absorb them both and make them disappear into space because _no, Gabe_ , people didn't look at Tyson like that. It was just a blowjob. It was just Tyson.

"Stop thinking so loudly." Gabe's hand rubbed gentle lines up and down Tyson's back, warm and reassuring and _safe_ in a way Tyson hadn't felt in so long. Had he ever?

"You're so much," Tyson finally said. "I don't know what to do with myself, knowing you're here and you—you say stuff like that."

"I _mean_ stuff like that."

"Yeah. Yeah, I know."

They stayed like that for a truly inadvisable long time, sweaty and gross and Tyson feeling like his body would never be enough to hold all of this, all of Gabe. Tyson's phone buzzed, but he hid his face against Gabe's neck, kissed him again. 

"Want me to look?" Tyson heard somewhere above him.

"Yeah, sure."

A beat, and Gabe's confused voice. "Uh, someone named Jamie just asked _who's Gabe_. All lower case. Wrong _who's_."

Tyson's eyes snapped wide open. Oh, fuck. 

By the time they managed to tear themselves out of bed, actually fucking shower with only a reasonable amount of groping each other, change the sheets, get dressed, and leave the house, it was early afternoon, the right time to catch the Stars at the end of their practice at Pepsi Center. Shoving a burger into Jamie's face usually helped keep anything like curiosity at bay. 

"Jamie's my best friend, like, my non-Nate best friend," Tyson said as he drove. "I moved around a lot as a kid and I met Jamie and like... He liked hockey! As much as I did! We lived and breathed that shit. We played together, too, on the same team in juniors, and we're still friends."

"You're really sweaty," Gabe said. 

"Am I?" Tyson asked, his voice cracking. "I don't think so. I think I'm sweating a normal amount for December."

When Tyson pulled into the players' lot of Pepsi Center, somehow, Jamie was already waiting for him. What the fuck, how did he _do that_?

"Hey, Tys," Jamie called. "Who's Gabe?"

Tyson was already out of the car, his mouth flapping open and closed like the useless dumb fish he was, as Gabe climbed out of the car and stood as tall as he could. Jamie still had an inch or two on him, not including the hair. 

"Oh, hey man, what's up," Jamie said to Gabe, then looked at Tyson again. "Who's Gabe?"

"That's Gabe," Tyson said.

"Obviously."

"Gabe, this is Jamie."

"Obviously," Gabe said.

"Oh, come on, can everyone stop being fucking _weird_ ," Tyson yelled. "Hey, I'm sorry I didn't tell you about Gabe."

"You didn't tell me you were dating some guy you met at Worlds _three years ago_ and he picked up all his shit from Sweden and moved in with you," Jamie said. "What the fuck, man? I have to hear it from _Johnson_?"

"Since when the fuck do you and EJ talk?"

"Uh, since you moved in with a guy no one had ever heard of before and he asked me what I knew about him! What the _fuck_ , man?"

"You said that already."

"I'm gonna say it as many times as I fucking want!" Jamie still looked mildly furious, but it broke after another second. "Come on, take me to lunch."

Jamie came over and enveloped Tyson in a big, warm hug, followed by three massive shoulder claps to let Tyson know the full clinging-to-one's-bro moment had passed. As Jamie got into the backseat, Gabe looked at Tyson over the roof of the car, his too-blond eyebrows arched extremely high. Tyson made a face and shrugged, then got into the car.

The thing about Jamie, Tyson realized as he drove all of them to Jaime's favorite restaurant in Denver, was that he was _excellent_ at compartmentalizing. Guys kinda had to be in the league when in a lot of cases they had grown up together, played for their country together, spent their summers together, then spent the rest of the year beating the shit out of each other in the quest for an oversized silver goblet. Jamie made small talk with Tyson, catching up since the last time the Avs had played Dallas (conveniently for the hell that was Tyson's life like, a week before Gabe fell to Earth), and he even laughed at Gabe's occasional comments and jokes. 

Then they sat down to lunch, ordered some waters, and Jamie folded his hands on the table.

"So who the fuck is Gabe?" Jamie asked. "Why hasn't anyone heard of him? Are you fucking a fugitive or something?"

"Did you talk to my mom?" Tyson asked.

"She called _me_ ," Jamie said defensively. 

"Holy fucking shit." 

"I'm right here, actually," Gabe said, waving a little hand at Jamie.

"I'll get to you in a minute," Jamie said. "Tys."

Tyson took a deep breath because Jamie was his best friend, his oldest friend, his oldest best friend, and if anyone else besides Nate deserved the whole truth, it was him. He reached for Gabe's hand and linked their fingers together, right on the table where Jamie could see; Tyson needed Gabe and he needed Jamie to know he was serious.

"So like a month ago, I was in a bad place and kinda having another breakdown, so I decided to propose to Nate and I was like, 75% serious about it, definitely 100% if he said yes but he didn't because he's Nate, and Nate and I just—you know, we don't."

"Like Sid would let you."

"He doesn't own Nate!"

"Ask Nate."

They laughed about that, but then Jamie immediately frowned again and Tyson continued.

"So, as I was like, sitting there listening to Nate tell me that it was okay and he would always be my friend and never leave me, I saw a star fall and I kinda figured it fell like, north by northwest or something, so I told Nate brb and got into my car and drove in that direction into the woods. I thought when the star fell that it would be a meteorite and I could chip a piece off and make Nate an engagement ring out of meteorite, but then I found Gabe."

"You found Gabe... where?"

"In the woods," Tyson said. "In a crater. He was the star. And he fell for some reason, and fell to Earth for some reason, and to Colorado for some reason, and I found him and he was hurt so I took him home—"

"Took me to a hospital first, to set my broken leg, and then he took me home," Gabe interrupted. 

Jamie stared at him, then his head swiveled back to Tyson. 

"And he's been living with me ever since. I told everyone he was my secret long-distance boyfriend who decided to move in with me now that I had retired, but now he's really my boyfriend and we're traveling with the team because I need to wean myself off the whole co-dependent hockey team dynamic and it's gonna take a while, and it would help Gabe to like, see lots of different places and how people live so. That's everything." 

Jamie sat there, hands folded on the table, for a while. Eventually, he leaned back into his side of the booth, ran a hand through his hair, and rested his hands on his thighs. He stared at Tyson, then at Gabe, then at Tyson again, his eyebrows furrowing more the more he thought about everything Tyson had just told him. 

"So you didn't lie to me," Jamie said. "You lied to everyone else."

"Uh, yeah," Tyson said. "You know how people get. It's still a little weird being a queer guy in the NHL—you think sleeping with a literal star fallen from space _who happens to look like a guy_ is gonna go any better?"

Jamie nodded wisely. "If he looked like Claire Danes, this would probably be a lot easier."

Tyson stared at Jamie a little longer. His hand was getting sweaty, and Gabe seemed to notice because he squeezed his hand gently and smiled at him. 

"Are we okay?" Tyson asked Jamie. "You're not mad?"

Jamie thought about it a little longer, then shook his head, then thought some more and shrugged.

"Little mad it took you a month to tell me," Jamie said. "But I get it, I think. This sounds like a lot." Suddenly Jamie turned to look at Gabe. "Are you okay?"

"What?" Gabe asked, genuinely shocked.

"Like. You didn't fucking _exist_ a month ago, and now you're living with Tyson Barrie? Like, are you _okay_."

"What the fuck," Tyson laughed.

"Yes?" Gabe asked. "Tyson's great? Did I miss something?"

"I make the bed now, I'm a real ass adult," Tyson said. 

"If we go to your house right now, I'll see a fully made bed, huh?"

"Uh, not today," Tyson said quickly. "We stayed in this morning."

"Oh my _god_ , don't tell me, it's bad enough I had to hear you back in the day."

"Is he loud?" Gabe asked. "I think he's been holding back on me."

Jamie looked from Gabe to Tyson again. "He's your boyfriend and he doesn't know that wild dogs can hear you fucking?"

"I've been trying to play it cool!" Tyson said. "Have you _seen him_? I don't want to scare him away!"

"He seems to be under the impression that I'm debilitatingly attractive." Gabe frowned at Tyson, who held his hands up in the universal symbol of _YEAH, AND?_

Jamie nodded. "Yeah, you're okay. Like, no offense. I need emotional connection before I really find people super attractive, I'm not really a good judge of straight up hotness, whatever that means."

"That's so interesting," Gabe said. "Nate said I was Old Navy hot."

"Oof," Jamie said. "Not L.L. Bean hot? That's where he and Sid really get off. Sorry, man."

"Is this happening to me right now?" Tyson asked. "Is this my life?"

"Tys," Jamie said. Jamie was using his Serious Captain voice, which never worked on Tyson but Tyson appreciated the effort all the same. "Hey. It's okay. I'm happy for you. Both of you."

"We're keeping the whole... star thing... quiet, though. You get that, right?"

"Oh, for sure," Jamie said. "No one'll believe me anyway." 

Their food arrived and they busied themselves with eating, things a little awkward and overexposed between the three of them. Gabe compensated by stealing some of Tyson's fries, even though he had his own, until Tyson took his burger hand and took a bite out of his burger.

"What the hell," Gabe asked.

"You know you could share your food with those utensils next to your plates, right?" Jamie asked. "Gabe, did Tyson not show you what those are for?"

"What the fuck would you know about utensils," Tyson replied. "You didn't own a spoon until your mom bought you a cutlery set like, five years ago."

"You were the only person ever mad about that because you had to eat ice cream with a knife."

"Listen to what you just said. To the words that just came out of your mouth."

"This burger's still so good," Jamie said. "You have to bring Gabe to Dallas. What are you doing for the bye week?"

"Oh, shit, the bye week," Tyson said. "It's at the end of January, I think? Right after All-Star weekend."

"Yeah, ours is the week before," Jamie said. "Gonna show Gabe some place nice?"

"Bye week?" Gabe asked.

"Every team gets a week off in January," Tyson said. "Most of us go away, the families put big trips together with all their kids. Yeah, we gotta figure that out."

"Nate didn't book a trip for you guys like, two years in advance? He's off his game."

"Someone's bye week didn't line up with his so it's like, what's the point." Tyson sighed. "All right, that's my job this year."

Jamie turned to Gabe and pointed a finger right at him. "Make him take you somewhere warm. He forgets he's total fucking beach trash until he's actually _there_."

"I'd be wearing my board shorts right now if it weren't like, twenty degrees."

"Yeah, but you always go home for a few days because you feel guilty. Fuck that shit. Go to a resort somewhere. If you really wanted to be home, you would've moved back already."

If Tyson had to sum up their relationship in one stupid overwrought metaphor, Jamie was the bull in Tyson's china shop. There, Tyson had carefully arranged all the plates to give his life the semblance of order. Meanwhile, Jamie would walk in looking for a bathroom and knock an entire cabinet over, like when he pointed out so easily that what Tyson thought was totally inevitable (putting his life on hold for several months or a year while he let his parents badger him into figuring out his life) wasn't going to happen. If Tyson had been hurt earlier, forced to retire earlier in his career, maybe his parents could have been a good support system. Now he had his found family and a better sense of what he was good at, what he could do, what he _wanted_.

"You're right," Tyson said. "Yeah, we'll go somewhere warm. Some island somewhere."

"A warm island! Some fancy ass all-inclusive resort where there's swim-up bars and cabanas and shit. _Blue water, Tys_."

"All the oceans are blue," Gabe said, a little unsure because why wouldn't they oceans be blue?

"Maybe from space," Jamie said. "The ocean where we grew up was like, rocky and craggy and blue sometimes but mostly grey and muddy. Sad ocean."

"It's not sad, it's beautiful in its own way," Tyson said.

"It's not relaxing-in-a-cabana beautiful." Jamie pointed at Gabe again. "Cabanas or bust."

Gabe nodded very seriously, then took out of his phone to google photos of cabanas.

After lunch, Tyson drove Jamie to the team hotel. He pulled over and walked Jamie to the entrance, Gabe waiting in the car.

"Are we okay?" Tyson asked.

Jamie looked at him. "Yeah, man, why wouldn't we be?"

"The... lying thing?"

Of course, the thing that wrecked Tyson with worry was the thing that made Jamie shrug. "You've been going through it, man. I wish I could help more."

"You do help."

"I can't take you to Dairy Queen whenever you need me."

"I do eat at other places! You guys would tell me if I was like, viral marketing for DQ, right? I want a cut of that shit."

Jamie laughed. They stood at the entrance to the hotel together, both their hands shoved deep in their pockets. Jamie leaned in and elbowed Tyson's side until Tyson elbowed him back.

"Gabe seems fun," Jamie said. "Sorry, I mean, Gabe seems like literally the best guy you've ever dated. Shut up, I know you've dated okay guys, but none of them have looked at you the way he does. He fucking—man, he _loves_ you."

Tyson looked down at his shoes. "I'm easy to love, right? I mean, you land on Earth with nothing and no one and this lonely hockey player finds you—"

"Tys, do you really believe that? Does he do stuff that I'm not seeing? If he is and you need a way out, just say so, okay? We're literally millionaires. I don't care. I'll do anything for you and I can think of ten guys right now who would, too."

"Why does everyone think the worst of Gabe?" Tyson laughed. "I mean, you look at him and you look at me, _he's_ not the drain on someone's resources, you know?" Tyson made the mistake of looking at Jamie's face, Jamie's giant dumb heartbroken and pitying face, and then he got sucked up into one of Jamie Benn's sadness-destroying hugs.

"You're good, Tyson," Jamie said. "Everyone else sees it. Why don't you?"

"I mean, it's so much more fun this way," Tyson said, laughing weakly. "Why should I have a personality when I can just hate myself?"

"If I could separate you into Tyson Barrie and the asshole that hates my best friend Tyson Barrie, I would have drop kicked him into the sea years ago." Jamie, in a clear departure from bro-code that the moment demanded, kissed the top of Tyson's head. "Tell that guy to shut the fuck up. Listen to me, or Nate, or Gabe, or literally anyone in the city of Denver instead. Shit, listen to the weekend staff at DQ, who keep asking their manager to add your order to the menu." 

"I tip really well," Tyson mumbled against Jamie's shoulder. "Ugh, let me go. Message received, okay?"

Jamie pulled away and rested his hands on Tyson's shoulders. "We're gonna keep telling you. That's just a thing you need to hear every single day. You're worth it. Get used to it."

Tyson mumbled a few more things and promised he would see Jamie after the game, before the team left for Dallas again. Back in the car with Gabe, Tyson buckled in and stared at the dashboard for a moment. 

"He looks like he gives good hugs," Gabe said. 

"He does," Tyson said.

"Better than mine?"

Tyson laughed. "No! They're different."

"Does his body temperature run warmer than mine? What if I spread my hands out to cover more of you?"

"We can experiment in the guest bedroom," Tyson said. "Then throw all the sheets in the laundry."

"Do you only have the two sets of sheets? Tyson? Tyson. _Tyson_!"

*

The organization's holiday party/family skate was scheduled for a random mid-afternoon during their first stretch of home games in the longest damn time. Gabe wore his hottest boring dad outfit, like a spy in a movie who was commissioned to go undercover in the suburbs and showed up at a PTA meeting with a wind machine and slow motion edit. Tyson was too distracted to find the button on his keys to unlock the car door, so: it was fine, family skate was going to be fine. 

"All of these children skate better than I do," Gabe said as he stood next to Tyson behind the glass of the practice rink. "I'm exaggerating, but am I?"

"You are," Tyson said. "Do you want to skate?"

"What if one of them thinks I'm an adult and grabs my leg and I fall on them and destroy them? Actually, I haven't weighed myself since I landed. I wonder if my bones are supermassive and heavy."

"Sure, that's a thing the bed could survive," Tyson said. "We could go eat."

"But we have to skate. It's family skate."

"Lots of people aren't skating. I promise, no one has ever been kicked out of family skate for not skating. Well, we once put a pissy teammate in a garbage can, but that was a rough year and it had nothing to do with skating."

Gabe whined and hummed under his breath, then took Tyson's hand. "Okay, let's skate."

"We don't have to! Remember what I—"

"I don't like being _nervous_ ," Gabe said. "Or scared, or anxious, or unsure, or shaky, or uncoordinated, or—what are other things I don't like?"

"Oh, Gabe," Tyson said. "Yeah, let's go, you've gotta step on the ice now."

"I don't have to if I don't want to."

"You don't have to but you have to."

Gabe frowned and pouted and held his breath and finally stepped out onto the ice with Tyson. They stood there for a moment until Tyson raised his eyebrows expectantly.

"Come on, show me off," Tyson said. "Let's go. Get moving. Start skating."

"What if I fall on my face and lose all my teeth?" Gabe asked as he pushed off slowly. 

"EJ's hotter without teeth than with teeth. You could do worse."

"You think he's hot?" 

"Uh."

"Without teeth?"

"Listen, it's complicated."

"Is it? What about Nate?"

"Nate's _Nate_."

"EJ's your type?" Gabe asked. Tyson tried to hide how much he was grinning, because Gabe was skating so easily with his mind on something else entirely. "He looks like one of his horses."

"He has beautiful horses!"

"You like his horses, too?"

"Gabe, are you _jealous_?"

"Am I?" Gabe made a face to himself that made Tyson grin even wider. "I don't like that either."

The practice ice was full of little kids holding onto their parents and siblings and tiny hockey nets and other props, all whining with the same fear. Gabe did his best to avoid coming within three feet of any of them, but he let Tyson take over and pull them out of the way when they came across kids skating too close to them. 

"Tyson!" yelled one of the kids across the ice. "Come play!"

"Oh, that's Matt's kid," Tyson said. "Calvert's."

"Go play," Gabe said. "I'm going to practice my form."

"Your _what_. What form?!"

"My not falling down," Gabe laughed. "I'll be less embarrassing when you're done playing."

"It's not a contest!" Tyson yelled over his shoulder as he went to join the kids getting a pick-up game together. The kids had already roped Nemo into being The Other Guy on each of their teams, so Tyson shot Gabe one last glance over his shoulder before focusing on the game at hand. 

The kids' dads broke up their game a while later, Nemo's team leading because they weren't playing as dirty as they had at family skates past. Tyson high-five'd the kids and followed them off the ice to where the food and tables had been set up. EJ walked by with someone's toddler sitting on his shoulders and pointed his mile-long arm over to the face-painting station, where Nate had a kid on his lap and his eyes scrunched closed as they painted his face to look like a dog's, complete with DOGG on one of his cheeks because, god, Nate, _why_. 

Meanwhile, Gabe was at a table with a couple of partners, EJ's and Soda's, one of Soda's kids standing on Gabe's lap and pulling at his hair while Gabe listened to him babble. Gabe spotted Tyson and looked—fuck, he looked so warm and content, and his smile changed ever so slightly and seemed just for Tyson.

"Stop hogging the kids," Tyson growled as he scooped the kid out of Gabe's lap and settled them across his arms like he sometimes did with Nate's dog Henry. "And you, buddy, you stop hogging my boyfriend." 

Gabe pulled Tyson close, kissing Tyson's cheek and getting his face slapped by Soda's kid because the kid was little and it was hilarious. Tyson realized Gabe had been glowing just a little until he got slapped, but it wasn't so noticeable under the fluorescent lights and next to the blinding sheet of ice next to them. 

"He's shiny! Gabe's shiny!" the kid said, laughing as Tyson tickled his sides. 

"And you're stinky, anyone tell you that?"

"I'm not, you are!"

"No you!"

"No YOU!"

"You're such a great influence, Tyson," Soda groaned as he stood up. "Come on, hand them over, _someone_ has to eat something before they get hangry."

"I'll race you and your dad to the food," Tyson said. "Ready? You ready? _You ready_?"

"Sit with me and stop torturing the children," Gabe laughed as he held his hand out.

"Whose stuff is this, Comphy's?" Tyson asked. He easily dumped it onto another chair and sat down next to Gabe, then kissed him. "Did you eat? Did you skate some more? Did you eat? I'm so hungry, let's eat." 

"Yes I skated, yes I ate a little, yes let's get up and find you something to gnaw on."

"Nah, stay here, I can get up and steal a hundred pigs in blankets for us all by myself."

Gabe's eyes lit up. "Those are so good. Why are those so good?! If you get some of those, I want more, too."

"I'll think about it." Tyson smirked and lowered his voice. "Make me an offer."

"I'm fresh out of family-friendly offers, Tyson."

"Okay, okay, but you owe me something good and obscene later."

They kissed again and Tyson smiled, then left his seat to waddle over in his skates back towards the food tables, where EJ had beat Tyson to the punch. He was scooping up pigs in blankets by the plateful, eyeing Tyson like he _knew_ what he was thinking. Just then, the little kids' game of tag that had been happening around the adults' conversation decided to intersect sharply with Tyson. "Whoa, buddies, slow down!" Tyson took an awkward step to avoid crashing into the kids, but his skate wobbled, and then his bad knee, and then he was on his ass, his knee _screaming_ in pain.

EJ reached him first, but Tyson was quickly surrounded by a whole team of hockey players, _his_ whole goddamned team of hockey players. There was a shift in the crowd around him until Gabe was there, resting a hand on Tyson's waist and was saying something in his ear about standing up. Tyson pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes, trying to shut out his knee and the noise and the _pain_ , fuck _off_. 

"Come on, Tys, let's get you up—"

"EJ, I'm _fine_."

"You're hurt, let us help."

"I can do it myself."

"You don't _have to_ do it yourself."

"Yes I do," Tyson snapped. "This'll happen to me again when you're all in another city, next week or next year, and I'll have to do it myself, so just—fucking let me."

"Then let Gabe help," EJ replied. "There's twenty fucking guys here who want to pick you up and help you, _let us help_."

Tyson tried to take a deep breath, but that didn't stop those thoughts rushing back to him, overcoming him in a wave he hadn't felt in weeks: _They'll help, but for how long? They'll help, but how much? They'll feel sorry for you, no one likes feeling sorry. No one likes someone who's down. Stay down and they'll leave; no one likes someone who's down and can't get up_.

"Breathe through it, Tys, it's okay," EJ said near him, in a quiet voice he never, ever used. 

Tyson took another breath and tried to ignore the tears welling up behind the pressure he put on his eyes. He took a breath, then another, then dropped his hands and looked to his left, where he knew Gabe was crouched. "Gabe, could you help me to the trainers' room?"

Gabe didn't speak as he and EJ helped Tyson stand again. "You okay with just Gabe?" EJ asked. 

"I'm fine."

Tyson leaned his weight on Gabe, every step on his bad side radiating a sharp pain that threatened to eat the entire planet and _fuck_ why didn't it, why didn't it just take Tyson, why wasn't it bad enough to—

"Room's open," Nate said from up ahead. "Casey's here, too, if you want—"

"I just need a chair and an ice pack, thanks, Nate," Tyson said.

"Casey said the sleeves are in the purple cabinet, if you—"

"Thanks, Nate."

He heard Nate exhale, that familiar _I'm going to give you space but I don't like it and I'm going to tell you how much I don't like it later_ , but that was future Tyson's problem, along with this knee that was going to give out under him whenever he least expected for the rest of his extremely long, devoid-of-hockey, weak ass fucking life. 

"Here's a chair," Gabe said, like Tyson couldn't see it for himself. Tyson let go of Gabe and held on to the edge of a countertop as he maneuvered himself into the chair. God, he still had his fucking skates on, this wouldn't have happened if he hadn't been an idiot and skating, and wearing his skates off the ice, if he had just—

"What do you need?" Gabe asked. "Ice? That sleeve Nate mentioned? I can—"

"Just go, Gabe, it's fine."

"It's _not_ fine."

"It's fine! I'm being fucking dramatic, okay? It's just a tweak, it happens sometimes, it's _gonna_ happen sometimes, I just need to sit here and get over it." He hadn't been blunt with Gabe before, or hurt in front of Gabe before. Gabe was seeing this new, hurt, weak, awful side of Tyson and Tyson couldn't bear to look at Gabe's face. He couldn't deal with other people's faces and their pity; he already had his own and that was more than enough. 

"Can I kiss you?" 

Tyson's eyes snapped up to look at Gabe. There it was, his concerned face, his _beautiful_ concerned face, like someone was about to award him a medal for sainthood and good deeds done to a short little bitch of a man who couldn't get through a holiday party without fucking it all up for everyone. 

"I can't do anything else, can I?"

"I don't want a kiss right now," Tyson said. "I don't want anything right now."

"Do you _need_ anything right now?"

"Yeah! I need my body to stop being worthless garbage! What do you have for that? A kiss won't help that!"

Fuck, Tyson hadn't been this angry in so long. It almost felt good to be so shitty and upset, to really show Gabe what it meant to be in his life because he had no idea, did he? Now he would.

Gabe rested a hand on his shoulder and kneeled down. Tyson didn't move, except to keep his eyes firmly fixed on the floor of the trainers' room, where Gabe's concern and his goodness couldn't reach him. Then Gabe took his hand and rubbed it between his own, and lifted it up to kiss the back of Tyson's hand. 

Of course, _of course_ , that wave of anger broke. Left behind again was just Tyson, hurting. 

"I'm sorry," Tyson said. "I'm sorry I'm like this. I'm sorry you have to see me like this."

"It's okay. Can I get you an ice pack?"

Tyson nodded. "Fridge is over there, get one of the flexible ones. The wraps are in the drawer to the left of the fridge."

"What about pills? Aspirin or something?"

"They're closer to me, I think I can reach them." Gabe shot him a look. "Okay, the drawer to my left, there's a bunch of little packets of two, grab me two packets and a water."

They went through the motions: Tyson taking the pills, wrapping the ice pack around his knee, pointing out to Gabe where the compression sleeves were kept, asking for another chair to be brought over so Tyson could elevate until he was ready to go out there again.

"Let me take your skates off," Gabe said.

"I can get my skates." Tyson glanced up and saw Gabe biting something back. Tyson tried not to roll his eyes, but failed miserably. "Could you go to the stall with our stuff and get my shoes?"

Tyson did as he promised, unlacing his skates and bending his good leg to pull one off. He left the other for Gabe, who gently pulled the other skate off and dropped both pairs of their shoes next to his chair. Then Gabe pulled up another chair for himself and started to take off his own skates. 

"You don't have to stay," Tyson said. "I've got everything, I've got my phone, I can entertain myself back here."

"Maybe I want to stay here," Gabe said. "Maybe this is where the fun people hang out at holiday parties and that's why Nate and EJ wanted to come with you."

"You're so funny."

Gabe didn't answer. He was arranging his skates and Tyson's skates off to the side somewhere, and then he slipped on his boots, lacing those back up again. 

"Being hurt really sucks," Tyson said. "I hate it."

"I noticed."

"It's super unattractive."

Gabe paused in lacing up his boot. He sat back in his chair and leaned on his hand, like he was examining Tyson under a microscope. He furrowed his brow and, like a weirdo, shrugged aggressively at Tyson.

"You're worried about how attractive you look while you're in pain?" Gabe asked. "Do I _want_ to delve into that?"

Tyson turned bright red. Ugh, how did everything suck so _much_. 

"This isn't fun pain, this is, like, _I want to destroy the entire world so then I feel guilty about destroying the entire world and then I don't feel pain anymore_ pain."

"That's... very specific."

"Well, I've had a lot of time to think about it. Like, a year." Tyson exhaled. "No, probably longer than that. I was still playing and pushing myself too much, and hurting myself so I could work through it, like a moron."

"Yeah," Gabe said. 

"Yeah? I'm a moron?"

Gabe shrugged again. "You can't help it. You're not an ethereal space creature like me. It happens."

Tyson cracked a smile. "You're such a dick."

"You found me," Gabe began. "In a crater, in a forest, with a broken leg, and you had to listen to me whine about that cast for a week. You're lucky I heal fast, Tyson. I don't know if you would have put up with another day of me and that fucking cast."

"I was prepared for six to eight weeks of whining," Tyson laughed. "I've been there, we've all been there."

"We haven't," Gabe said. "You're part of a special breed of gluttons for punishment."

Tyson sighed. "Yeah."

Neither of them spoke for a while, both of them sitting in their chairs that sort of faced each other, with room for Tyson's leg to stretch out and elevate. Tyson watched Gabe's face. He looked... almost ordinary here, as ordinary as the most handsome man Tyson had ever seen could be. He looked like he was deep in thought, his thumb stroking the edge of his beard as he stared at nothing in particular. It was so, so strange for Tyson to think that he was seeing something new, but. It was just Gabe. It was just Gabe, sitting there in his nice slacks and a long-sleeved, button-down shirt under a warm, dark green sweater. He looked like any man, and he looked like _Gabe_. 

Tyson stretched out, his hand reaching for Gabe. Gabe noticed, then reached out and took Tyson's hand, linking their fingers together. 

"I can't fix this," Tyson said. "Neither can you. Okay? It's—I'm gonna get hurt sometimes, and it's gonna suck and I'm gonna hate it. I'm sorry."

"I know, Tyson. But we still want to help."

"You don't—"

"Tyson. You don't have to do it yourself. Sometimes, probably, you might be out somewhere alone, or at home alone, and you'll get hurt and you'll deal with it then. The rest of the time? When you're surrounded by people who want to help you?"

"You make it sound so easy," Tyson laughed. "Stop being alone, Tyson. Stop being stubborn, Tyson. Like, good luck."

Gabe made a face at him. "I know you're trying. Probably. Maybe you're thinking about trying."

"Stop making me smile."

"Fuck you, I'll do what I want."

Tyson burst out laughing. 

Even worse than a tweak to his knee was Tyson and Gabe emerging from the trainers' room, the leg of Tyson's pants rolled down to cover the knee sleeve, Gabe's hand warm in his own. Heads turned to look at them; Tyson waved and shrugged. 

"Yeah, I'm fine. Just a fall. It's okay."

They sat down at a mostly empty table with Nate and some of the younger guys. Gabe's arm wrapped around the back of Tyson's chair, a protective weight that made Tyson feel worlds better for no reason at all. He glanced at Nate, who gave him a little smile then went back to picking at his lunch. 

"Sorry," Tyson said.

"What are you apologizing for? You're the one who fell."

"I know you want to help."

"We all do."

"Yeah, but you look sad when you can't."

"You say that about everything. You always tell me I look sad." Nate put his fork down. "I dunno what you think you could do that would make me stop being there for you, but like. Keep trying. We're ride or die. _And_ you can't say it's because Gabe sees your dick and I don't because, man, I have seen your dick more than anyone else on this planet."

"Yeah, but Gabe sees past my dick."

"Into what, your bladder?"

"It's a METAPHOR."

"The two of you," Gabe interrupted, "When you talk about your feelings? It might be the most painful thing I've heard so far, short of breaking another bone. Tyson, I'm going to make you a plate. Nate, do you want one? I think Tyson has earned a bucket of those baby hot dogs."

"I'll steal out of Tyson's bucket," Nate said.

"I don't share, Nathan."

"You'll share and you'll like it," Gabe said.

Tyson rolled his eyes. "You're setting a bad example for the children! We're supposed to be a virtuous model of a queer relationship!"

Gabe leaned in and kissed Tyson softly. Tyson pulled back a little, the better to look into Gabe's searing blue eyes. They were clear and beautiful, like Tyson could see himself and forever in them, which had to be one of the stupidest and neediest thing he had ever thought in his life. Tyson kissed him again, then smiled when Gabe stood up.

"What are you laughing about?" Gabe asked. 

"Nothing."

"You're smiling. Why? What's wrong? What did I do?"

"Maybe I just like to look at you." Tyson's eyes focused on Gabe's lips, then took in the rest of his face—he was warm and pleased and amused as he looked at Tyson, and all of that created something _radiant_ that lit up Tyson's heart like nothing had before. "Maybe you're wonderful to look at."

Gabe looked even more pleased, grinning at Tyson and biting his lip before he stood up to check out the food again. Tyson watched him leave until he felt Nate elbowing him in the side pretty persistently. "What?" 

"You gave him a compliment. I'm so proud of you."

"What? Shut up! I compliment my boyfriend plenty!"

"If you say so."

"I do! And what do you know about how to treat people you're dating? You're twenty-three, you probably think feeding each other shots is the height of intimacy."

"I know nice things get you laid and mean things don't."

"He likes me when I'm mean."

Nate cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled, "HE LIKES YOU, IDIOT."

Tyson glared at Nate, then looked up just in time to see Gabe cup his hands around his mouth across the room and yell back, "YOU LIKE ME, TOO."

It was such a small, stupid, adorable thing, something that startled their friends and families into laughter, something that made EJ cackle obnoxiously, and it all made Tyson laugh and it made Tyson want to scream and leave his entire body behind. It wasn't _maybe this is love_ or _I probably love him_ —it was the sudden punch of surety, that this was love and home and everything Tyson could never admit he wanted. 

"Oh, god," Tyson said. "This is... this is gross. I'm a gross person with gross feelings. They all look like Gabe, the dad-shaped dork I brought to the family skate."

Nate laughed to himself and let Tyson punch him in the shoulder until Gabe returned with two mountains of food. He passed one to Nate, then dragged Tyson's chair closer to his own and put an arm around him, like they were any other couple at the party. Tyson let himself lean against Gabe, stealing snacks from the plate on Gabe's lap and trying so hard to keep the deep well of feelings from rushing up and drowning him.

*

One morning, the Sedins called. _Those_ Sedins, the ones who Tyson had spoken to outside a game all of once when they half-heartedly tried to convince him to sign with Vancouver. If he thought about it, he was still a little resentful they didn’t want him that much; then again, two years ago he didn’t want to leave Denver and Nate and the boys, and he still thought he had a future as a hockey player. Things changed fast in his business, really fast, but Tyson couldn’t imagine why the Sedins were calling him at nine in the fucking morning. 

“Because it’s five o’clock here, Tyson,” Henrik said patiently. “It’s homework time and then supper. This is life with children.”

Tyson was tempted to snap back a _no shit, dude_ , but then he remembered they were like, the reigning champions of kindness in North American hockey and if Henrik was treating him like an idiot, it was because he was a good person and probably knew that Tyson was an idiot. 

“I’m going to put you on speakerphone with myself and Daniel,” Henrik said. 

“Hello, Tyson! How are you!” said another voice that could very fucking well be Daniel or just be Henrik again, what the fuck did Tyson know.

“Hey there,” Tyson said slowly. “Uh. Good to hear from you guys. Little confusing, but, you know, good. How’s retirement?”

“It’s wonderful. How’s yours?”

“It fucking sucks, man, but it’s getting better."

“Carl asked us to contact you,” said one of the Sedins. He assumed it was Henrik. Why not.

“Carl who?”

“...Your teammate.”

Tyson thought for a whole minute before he said, “Right, Soda, of course. Do you guys really call him Carl? Does Soda not translate? It’s so cute! Unless he hates it. Did he tell you guys he hates it? I can totally tell EJ to lay off the nickname if he hates it. I'll call him Carl all the time, as obnoxiously as possible, promise.”

“He doesn’t have an opinion on it, Tyson, as far as we know. I thought you might know your teammate’s first name, but don’t worry about it." Tyson made a face, but Daniel continued. “He mentioned your new partner, Gabriel. Could we FaceTime with him?”

“Uh,” Tyson said. “Sure, I’ll ask him, but why?”

“Because we know what he is,” said Henrik. “We know he’s a fallen star.”

Tyson stayed quiet for a very, very long moment, then said, “Okay, uh, text me your FaceTime or whatever, I guess this number works for you guys? I’ll—he’s still asleep. Don’t judge him. He’s really—we had a late night and—”

“Of course. We’ll speak to you soon, Tyson.”

Tyson hung up and pressed his phone between his hands. He took several deep breaths, then went upstairs to the master suite.

Gabe was still asleep, light streaming in through the window and perfectly illuminating his perfect hair. His eyes were closed, his breathing was soft, his biceps were huge, and he was tangled in the sheets and comforter like it was the warmest, coziest fucking place on Earth. For all Tyson knew, it was; his opinion on beds in general had skyrocketed since Gabe started sleeping with him. He didn’t want to wake him, but the Sedins’ kids’ homework time and supper time was calling and like, _fuck_. 

“Gabe,” Tyson whispered as he climbed into bed. He pushed strands of hair out of Gabe’s face and sat back on his heels, watching Gabe stir. “Hey, wake up. There’s some—” Tyson swallowed the lump in his throat, something made up of fear and anxiety and relief, maybe, that Gabe wasn’t the only one of his kind. Fuck. Holy _shit_. “Gabe, come on. We need to get on FaceTime and talk to some guys, uh, you want to be awake for this.” 

Gabe rolled onto his back, caught Tyson’s hand, then opened his eyes. He smiled a little, then frowned when he seemed to take in Tyson’s face. God, what was Tyson’s face fucking doing to make Gabe look at him like that?

“What? What's wrong?” Gabe asked, bleary and beautiful the way he had absolutely no right to be. 

“We're gonna talk with a couple of guys I know from Vancouver,” Tyson said. “You're not alone. Like. Uh. Star-wise. You’re not the only one here.”

Gabe went on a very, very quick face journey, then climbed out of bed and went straight to the bathroom.

“Put on a shirt!” Tyson called out. “I’ll set up my laptop downstairs. They’re respectable shirt people!”

“Button-down shirt or would a polo shirt do?”

“Just cover your nipples!”

“God, _Tyson_ , that's so unhelpful.”

Too many minutes later, Tyson was at the dining room table, FaceTiming with the Sedins and waiting for Gabe to come downstairs. The Sedins were in a nice, well-appointed room somewhere, like a library with real books in it. Tyson could hear faint shrieking and yelling on their side, for which one of the twins looked apologetic. 

“We usually have both families together for supper,” Henrik explained. “Five children will make a racket.”

“Yeah, uh, you guys have fun with that,” Tyson said. “Sorry he’s taking so long. He’s really into clothes? Is that normal?”

“He’s a person, Tyson,” said Daniel.

"I mean, you don't have to say it like that. I knew _that_."

There was a rush down the stairs and there was Gabe, wearing very nice slacks and a very respectable polo shirt. He had showered and done his hair and Tyson had his breath taken away, which was ridiculous when Gabe was dressed in his finest business casual. He grinned nervously at Tyson, then took the seat next to him at the dining room table. He edged his seat closer, the better for both of them to fit in the frame, and then he smiled at the twins. 

“Hello,” Gabe said in English, then in Swedish. He was smiling, almost grinning, this close to beaming and coming out of his own skin. Tyson’s heart was going to break a little, fuck, Gabe wanted this so much and he didn’t even know what this was. 

“Hello, Gabriel! I’m Henrik and this is my brother Daniel.”

“Hello!” Gabe repeated. “This—you know Tyson.” Gabe suddenly did a double take. “You know Tyson? How?”

“We played hockey in Vancouver,” said Daniel or Henrik, fuck, Tyson forgot already, goddammit. “We played against Tyson a few times a year. Isn’t he funny?”

“He is,” Gabe agreed.

“Wait, how do you know that?” Tyson asked. “It’s not like I stood around telling knock knock jokes during faceoffs.” 

“Ha,” one of them laughed. “See? He’s so serious, so funny.”

“You are exactly like them,” Tyson said to Gabe, who looked a mix of offended and confused and proud, even if he knew nothing about the Sedins.

“Gabriel—”

“It’s Gabe, I go by Gabe, I like Gabe,” he interrupted. “Unless Tyson’s upset at me, and then he calls me Gabriel and it’s wonderful.” 

“Wow, you are just no filters around these guys, huh,” Tyson said.

“Tyson, be quiet,” Henrik said. “Gabe, one of the players, Carl, let us know he was a little—”

“Suspicious is too negative,” Daniel said. “Concerned?”

“That I wasn’t Swedish enough?”

“That you were literally fucking glowing, Gabe,” Henrik said. 

“You guys swear? What the fuck,” Tyson whispered. Gabe officially took the laptop and moved it over so he was the only one in frame, leaving Tyson to complain off to the side and lean in so he could at least watch. 

“And, yes, that your Swedish was a little strange but he couldn’t place why,” Henrik said. “Mostly, it was the glowing that made us think you could be one of us. Are you?”

“Did I fall out of space and crash in some forest in Colorado where Tyson found me?” Gabe asked. “YES. Are you? How did you—both of you?”

“We were a binary star,” Daniel said. “Two stars orbiting the same center, appearing from a distance like one star.”

“And you both fell,” Gabe said. 

They nodded together. 

“We were found in Sweden and raised by a family,” Henrik said. “We were, or looked, very young when we arrived, and we’ve aged. We don’t know if the same will happen to you. Maybe it was a difference in how we arrived, and when and where we landed.”

“We didn’t look as handsome as you do,” Daniel added. 

Gabe looked so fucking pleased and smug, then looked to Tyson. 

“He’s all right,” Tyson said.

“He’s like this,” Gabe said. 

“We noticed,” Daniel said. 

“So,” Gabe said. “You—how long did it take you to age? Did you have a hard time adjusting? Did you go to school? Why hockey? Did you like it? Should I start playing it? Do we have some kind of natural affinity for it? Is Sweden nice? Should Tyson and I visit? Is it all right for me to travel across an ocean? What if I dissolve into stardust? I need to know everything.”

The Sedins watched Gabe very closely, then glanced at each other from the corners of their eyes. 

“Gabe, we don’t have many answers,” Henrik said. “Except to the obvious things: Yes, some level of schooling is a fine idea for the socialization, but it sounds like you already have that with the team. School wouldn't hurt, though. No, you’re not going to be exceptionally good at hockey just because you're a star. No, you won’t turn into stardust if you travel. We don’t know very much and until now, we were the only ones of our kind. But you are human now—”

“I can heal super fast, can you?” Gabe asked.

“You guys were like, never out,” Tyson chimed in. “Like you got hurt sometimes—”

“Yes, we can heal quickly,” Daniel said. "That's about all that makes us—I don't know, slightly supernatural?"

“Do you think Ovechkin has special star powers, too?" Tyson asked. "He’s like, fucking immortal and unbreakable."

“No, Tyson,” Daniel said. "Alex is just like that."

“Can I ask one more thing?” Gabe interrupted. “You said you were—” Gabe took a breath and looked at Tyson, then looked away. “You were a binary star, and then you both fell, fell together, and you were raised as twins.”

“Yes,” Henrik said. 

“I was, too,” Gabe said.

“WHAT,” Tyson yelled. Gabe covered Tyson’s mouth with his hand, but he didn’t look at him.

“It’s hard to remember what it was like being in space—conscious but not in a body,” Gabe said. “But I know, I _remember_ I was a binary star with one named Beatrice. I remember that. Is there a chance that she fell, too? And maybe we were separated? And maybe—”

“We fell together,” Daniel interrupted gently. “In the same clearing, together, when we were very young boys. If she didn’t fall with you, then—I’m sorry. We don’t know.”

“We don’t,” Henrik said. 

Gabe nodded. “I just wanted to ask. Thank you.” Gabe glanced at Tyson, who knew his eyes were still as wide as dinner plates, and he dropped his hand from Tyson’s mouth. Tyson didn’t say anything; he took Gabe’s hand and pressed a kiss to his palm, then held his hand tight.

“Gabriel,” Henrik said. “We wanted to see you and talk to you, and tell you that you’re not alone.” 

“Oh,” Gabe said.

“Whatever your background here is, we’ll vouch for you, for whatever that’s worth,” Henrik said. “And if you want a pair of brothers, you have them.”

“We have other brothers, too, Earth brothers, they’ll like you, too,” Daniel added. “Let Tyson bring you here to visit some day. It’s pretty nice.”

Gabe took a deep breath and nodded again. “Yeah. Okay. Yeah, we can do that.” Gabe looked over at Tyson and smirked at him. “You heard that?”

“Yeah, it’s about time someone got me to Sweden, I guess,” Tyson sighed heavily.

“Take care of each other,” Henrik said.

“Tyson, give him our phone number,” Daniel said.

“I only have one of your numbers, guys. You have separate phones, right?”

Henrik looked very patient again, so Tyson knew he was being stupid. 

They all exchanged a few more pleasantries before the Sedins ended the call and Gabe closed the laptop. He took a deep breath, then looked at Tyson.

“So,” Tyson said. “You wanna… talk about that?”

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” Gabe began. “But I’m not sorry, not really. I didn’t want to burden you with one more thing.”

“Gabe. You have a sister. You have a _twin_.”

“I don’t." His eyes looked a little watery, tearing up and trying to smile through it. “Not really.”

“But they—”

“They fell together,” Gabe said. “At the same time, into the same place, and grew up together. A binary star in space, it’s nothing like a twin. She—” Gabe’s face crumpled a little as he tried to find the words. “You have no idea how big space is. I keep saying that, but you have _no idea_. In this body, I try to remember the vastness of space, and how this one particular light who called herself Bea was closer to me than the others, and it _hurts_. You can’t imagine the enormity of that distance. I literally can’t imagine it, it hurts me to imagine that distance again. It hurts knowing that I could have been that alone forever.” 

Tyson squeezed Gabe’s hand, for whatever that was worth. Gabe lifted his other hand and wiped at the corners of his eyes. 

“We both loved to watch Earth,” Gabe continued. “Compare what we had seen every day, what interesting people lived that day, what they did, what they said. And if she had fallen, too—but she didn’t.”

“I’m sorry,” Tyson said. “I’m so sorry.”

Gabe shook his head. “Don’t be. Can’t be sorry about something that never happened.”

“Uh, sure you can.”

“All right, fine.” Gabe laughed. “I’m sad. I didn’t think it was even possible that Bea could have come with me, but—they fell together. And she didn’t.”

“Yeah. It sucks.”

Gabe smiled a little. “I think she would have liked you. She always found interesting things to tell me about, stories about—oh, she loved dogs.”

“What?” Tyson laughed.

“She would tell me things about dogs! Did you see that family of wolves that kept a baby warm until it was rescued? Did you see that dog that played the piano? Did you see the dog surfing competition?”

“Okay, I definitely love your sister, Beatrice YouTube for Dogs Landeskog.”

Gabe grinned and laughed, then looked at Tyson. “I feel…” Gabe chewed on his lip. He was looking at Tyson, then his eyes darted away, like he was too full of energy to focus it all in one place, doing one thing, saying anything. “I don’t know,” Gabe said. “I’m guilty about Bea, that she didn’t—that she can’t be with me having these experiences. But I’m also happy for myself? I think I’m happy. I’m not alone. Stars fell before, they landed, they _lived_. They seemed happy, right?”

“They’re like, the most fucking decent guys who have ever played hockey,” Tyson said. “I don’t know if that’s related to the whole falling from space thing, but they’re solid guys.”

Gabe nodded, then beamed at Tyson and leaned in and kissed him. 

“What was that for?” 

“I don’t know!” Gabe laughed. “Can’t I kiss you? Can’t I be happy?” He leaned in and kissed Tyson again. “There, I kissed you again and I’m still happy. I’m going—” He stood up and looked around. “Tyson, come on, let’s go somewhere. Drive me somewhere. Open the windows so we can scream on the highway.” He reached for Tyson’s hands and pulled him out of his seat, Tyson stumbling clumsily over Gabe’s chair until he stood in front of Gabe, who had let go of Tyson’s hands so he could run his hands up and down Tyson’s arms. “I’m not a fluke or an accident or a mistake, I’m _here_. I’m going to be okay, Tyson.”

“Is that what scared you?” Tyson asked. “Of course you’re gonna be okay.”

“But now I know that!” Gabe wrapped his arms around Tyson, then pulled away and kissed him again. “Come on, let’s go out and drive and do whatever we want.”

“Put on shoes first, come on,” Tyson said. “I’ll take you anywhere you want.”

“Anywhere _you_ want,” Gabe said. “And _you_ put shoes on. You heard what they said. We have to take care of each other.” Gabe laughed out loud as he ran upstairs. “Don’t make my brothers angry, Tyson!”

Tyson’s heart wanted to grow four or five sizes, just to fit the joy radiating off of Gabe in waves. All he could do was put on his socks and his boots, bundle up for the December wind outside, and think about all the places he and Gabe hadn't seen yet. 

*

"Yeah, I fucked up my knee at family skate," Tyson told Kimberly. How was her ponytail always perfect? Her hair looked extremely sharp at the ends, like if she whipped it around she could take out his eye. 

"A little fucked or—"

"Just a tweak. It was okay again in a few days. My skate and my ankle kinda went one way and my knee went another, but the guys and Gabe helped me up and it was okay."

She nodded. "Just okay?"

Tyson had his hands folded in his lap. It was harder to think of things to talk to Kimberly about since, overall, things were _just okay_ in his life at the moment. There were brief moments of panic and anxiety and _you're going to die alone on your bathroom floor and Nate won't find you for a week and you'll scar him for life and he'll never recover and he'll drink himself to death and it wasn't enough to ruin your own life YOU JUST KILLED NATE_. Otherwise, he felt... okay.

"Yeah, it's okay."

"Gabe's still good?" 

Tyson made a bunch of faces—first a smile, then a cringe, then a grin, then looking off into the distance, out the window of Kimberly's office. "He's... disgustingly good."

"Does it actually disgust you how good he is?"

"No, of course not, I'm just disgusted at how warm and gooey it makes me. Eugh."

"You know your body is filled with warm gooey organs, wrapped in even more goo? Even your bones have that gross warm stuff inside them that keeps them alive."

"You should write Hallmark cards."

"Ha ha, Tyson." She raised her eyebrows at him. "Tell me about Gabe. How's he adjusting to life here?" 

Tyson exhaled. "Really well. Like, _really_ well. He doesn't get sales tax, but I don't either. He and Nate and all the guys get along so great. And like, everyone. Everyone we know loves him. I think I do, too."

"You've known him a long time."

"I haven't, though," Tyson said. "I didn't know him at all before I lived with him, not really. And that's—it's fucking crazy, right? This guy I didn't know at all comes into my life and like, in a month, I love him. That's _insane_."

"Do you really think that?"

"I should, right?"

Kimberly shrugged slightly. "Do you want to think that? Does calling it insane makes it more palatable to you?"

"Okay, listen, just like, pretend I'm a normal person telling you—"

"Oh, okay, it's that time of year again where I remind you that no one's normal," Kimberly said. "No one. Absolutely no one. There's normal for huge populations, for whole societies: don't eat people, don't murder people, that's kind of all we can agree on as a species. That's it. As awful as it sounds, we _as a society_ debate everything else." 

Tyson nodded and looked down at the carpet some more. 

"What are you thinking?"

Tyson cleared his throat because everything that was about to come out of his mouth was—it was a lot. "So. My friend Jamie who I went through junior hockey with, he and his brother and his sister had the _Buffy_ DVD box set and the four of us would watch it way too much, and when we went away to hockey, Jamie took it with him and we'd watch it every chance we get. And I still remember watching those season 2 episodes when Buffy and Angel fuck and Angel gets that moment of perfect happiness and then he becomes a monster, and I _know_ that's not going to happen but I'm pretty sure that's going to happen."

"I get that," Kimberly said. 

"Oh, okay, _you_ get that."

"Yeah, I do. _Buffy_ was pretty good at the time, and you think if something's not work, you're not doing it right. If you're enjoying it, it's probably wrong. Maybe it has to do with the toxic sports environment that shaped your entire life and called everything you wanted gross and bad?"

Tyson nodded. "And my family. They kinda... yeah. I never get to keep good things." Tyson sighed deeply and pressed his eyes closed. "Oh, fuck, that's _really_ fucking terrible.Oh, what the _fuck_."

"I dunno, it sounds like you're doing okay. Gabe sounds good and you haven't thrown him out on his ass or anything."

"Of course not! I wouldn't do that to him."

"You didn't drive Nate away, he's still around doing stuff."

"He lives a few houses down, I _can't_ drive him away."

"He can drive away any time he wants and he hasn't. Weird, right?"

Tyson felt himself frown and look disgusted again. "I think I'm okay. That can't last. Nothing ever does, though."

"It's a place to start." Tyson nodded and stared out into the parking lot again until Kimberly got his attention again. "So what are you doing for the holidays?"

Small talk, awesome, _that_ Tyson could handle.

*

One more time, Tyson brought his laptop out to the dining room table, he and Gabe sitting side-by-side and dressed in their most Respectable Gay looks. On the screen, a new FaceTime from Victoria popped up, before Tyson could really warn Gabe with anything besides _hey, uh, this might suck_. 

"Baby brother!!!" Victoria shrieked. "I thought I'd call you before we spent like, five hours trying to get Mom and Dad's FaceTime working." She lit up as her eyes shifted ever so slightly to the other half of the frame. "You must be _Gabe_. I've heard _nothing_ about you."

"It's nice to meet you," Gabe said.

"What do you _see_ in this dumbass?" Victoria asked. "Like, you're a _solid_ nine, nine and a half to my brother's four or five—"

"Is the one-to-ten beauty scale an actual North American metric?" Gabe asked Tyson. "I thought it was a joke from the movies, but is there some sort of ranking system I've wandered into unknowingly?"

"Oh my god, Tys, he's _so_ funny," she laughed. "Okay, tell me everything. How'd you meet?"

"For the fifteenth time," Tyson said. "We met at Worlds. He was hanging out with a friend of his from Tre Kronor and we sorta just said hi and... that's it."

"Love at first sight?" she asked. "With _you_? That's a _riot_."

Tyson felt Gabe reach for his hand and squeeze his fingers, too distracted to even go for the whole hand hold. Tyson couldn't blame him.

"Super funny," Tyson replied. "We're laughing extremely hard here."

"Gabe, my brother doesn't have sense of humor," Victoria said. "Our parents are probably gonna make like, ten inappropriate jokes that Tyson won't laugh at, so you're gonna hear that at least ten more times. One day we'll find his fun spot, I'm sure, and _don't_ turn that into a sex thing, _please_."

"No one was going to do that until you just did," Tyson said. "Literally just now. God. I'm calling Mom and Dad now."

"No, come on, tell me something cute you and Gabe have done since he moved in! How did Nate take the divorce?"

"Nate's a very good friend," Gabe said. "I don't know what you mean."

"Oh, god, of course you'd say that about Tyson's stupid third-wheeling baby. Can't he take a hint? This is why I'm glad you were never one of those guys who had to date like, _super_ young guys because Nate's _way_ too young and clingy for you. Do you want me to text him that you and Gabe need your alone time? Like, at least tell me he doesn't sleep over anymore."

Tyson ended the call. He'd pretend it was an accident, but first he had to take a breath and lean his forehead against Gabe's shoulder. The laptop rang again, letting him know Victoria was trying to reconnect, but Tyson closed the laptop and ignored it.

"Last year, after my surgery, I was having a really tough time—before I really let my therapist help, when me and my agent were still figuring out the business side of retiring. It was really stressful, figuring out this huge sum of money, my last NHL player salary, that has to last me a pretty long time. I was having nightmares and they got so bad I asked Nate to sleep over because I slept better with someone else there." Tyson wiped his eyes before he added, "And his dog, Henry stayed with me when Nate was traveling with the team because I couldn't be alone. It wasn't a long time, but, you know. It's still something funny, I guess."

Gabe stared at him for a beat.

"Nope, it's not funny and I fucking hate it," Tyson decided. "I really hate that she thinks it's a joke so guess what! We're going to be polite and patient and hang up as soon as we can."

"Good," Gabe said.

Tyson opened his laptop again. The FaceTime menu was still up on the screen, but neither of them made a move to reconnect. Tyson felt Gabe's hand touch his jaw, a finger turning Tyson's head to look at Gabe. 

"I'm sorry," Gabe whispered as he leaned in and kissed him. Tyson kissed Gabe back, lifting his own hands to cup Gabe's face and kiss him deeply. It was important to him: that Gabe knew how much Tyson wanted him, that Gabe stay with him just a little longer, just through this phone call, just until Tyson stopped shaking. Gabe kissed him through it, his hand steady at the nape of Tyson's neck, resting his forehead against Tyson's when they broke apart to breathe. 

"We're going to California for Christmas," Tyson said suddenly. "Doesn't matter if we actually go. There's beaches. Santa Barbara's nice."

"Cabanas?"

"Probably?"

"Jamie said those were important."

"Jamie underestimates the cabana-to-beach ratio in general, I think, they're not like, _super rare_. I can set up a gazebo in the yard and call it a cabana in the summer. Get some of that gauzy light curtain shit for the walls."

"A gazebo would be nice," Gabe mused. 

Tyson kissed Gabe again and took a deep breath. "Okay. I'll call my parents. We'll be okay."

"Which is the cancel button in case I hate this experience too much?" Gabe looked around the keyboard and then smiled. "Oh, I can just shut the laptop closed. Great. Let's do this."

Tyson saw himself in the screen's reflection, smirking at the corner of his mouth, before he turned again and kissed Gabe's cheek. He reached for his hand and intertwined their fingers, then clicked to call his parents.


	4. Chapter 4

EJ, as the captain, usually hosted a New Year’s Eve party for the players after their traditional New Year's Eve game at Pepsi Center. This year was one of those years, so the party tent went up behind EJ’s house, the heat lamps were brought out, food was circulated, and drinks were poured. The tent this year was big enough for a sit-down dinner and a fucking dance floor because EJ was thirty now and, apparently, it was time to play grownups at New Year’s Eve.

“This is beautiful?” Gabe wondered as they entered the tent. “I don’t know why that’s a question, except that it’s EJ and—”

“Yeah, that’s a full stop,” Tyson laughed. “He puts on a good show, though. Also, like, professionals did all this. He just has to say _CLASSY PLEASE_ and write the check.”

“It’s very effective.” 

The New Year’s Eve party was usually cocktail attire, but this year EJ specified black tie. Gabe had matched his tux with a long peacoat that made him look like a classy vampire and Tyson his extremely willing victim/donor. 

Once the party was in swing, EJ led his girlfriend to the dance floor, microphone in hand. “I want to make this quick because we’ve got a lot to do before midnight, you know, bidding the old year out and welcoming the new year in or whatever,” he began. “So welcome back, old friends and new friends and everyone else who managed to weasel their way onto the guest list.” 

He grinned and Tyson noticed he was wearing his teeth, which, _what_. 

“Anyway, everyone have a great time tonight and…” EJ tapped his chin, looked deep in thought, then looked to Jackie. “Am I forgetting something?”

Jackie looked coy, then raised her hand to mimic his thinking pose and there it was, a massive engagement ring that hadn’t been there a week ago. 

“Oh, shit, right,” EJ laughed. “If you're here then you know us: we’ve been like, engaged to be engaged forever. This year, we finally decided to take the plunge. So, hey! Welcome to our surprising wedding!" EJ drank in the gasps and applause resonating through the tent, laughing before taking up the mic again. "Could the following people please come up and join our impromptu wedding party, so we can get this show on the road and _eat_? And like, celebrate the happiest day of our lives, etc.”

Tyson and Nate were two of the people summoned for EJ’s side along with a couple of friends from his hometown. While Jackie gathered her side of the party, boutonnieres and bouquets and an officiant materialized; the dance floor suddenly looked like it was ready for a goddamn wedding. 

“What the _hell_ , I’m not dressed nice enough for a wedding, this is only my third nicest tux,” Tyson hissed as he and Nate pinned each other’s boutonnieres on their lapels.

“Sounds like a _you_ problem, Tys,” EJ said as he walked by in his inspection of his best friends. “Treat all my black tie invitations like they could be a surprise wedding.” 

“How many more times do you plan on getting married?”

“To Jackie? As many as we want! Next year it’s gonna be our first anniversary party, so you better dress the fuck up for that, too. Nate, are you kidding me with this? Here, I’ll pin the flower on our T-bear and you go have another drink because you look more wrecked than I do.”

“I don’t like surprises!” Nate shrieked. 

“You know that, traditionally, there’s no trial by combat at these things, right?” EJ asked. “But we could set something up if that’s what you want.”

Nate rolled his eyes and wandered off, and EJ pinned the boutonniere on Tyson. He gave Tyson the once-over, then clapped his hands on Tyson’s arms and beamed at him. The teeth were alarming, but he looked happy. “We're really doing it, man. You ready?”

“I thought you were waiting for retirement. What gives?” 

EJ still had Tyson by the shoulders, so he drummed his fingers against Tyson's arms as he considered the question. 

“I want to be happy now,” EJ said. “Not that I’m not? Or _we're_ not? But it felt like we were putting it off for some big finish line down the road instead of doing it _now_ , and living _now_ , you know?”

Tyson cleared his throat. “Yeah, that—it makes a lot of sense.”

“Kids are way later, though,” EJ said with a wave of his hand. “We’re having way too much fun for that, so kids later. Sorry, I’m working out what I’m gonna tell everyone when they start asking because, _ya know_ , straight people.”

“For sure,” Tyson agreed as EJ bolted to his other friends and their hapless boutonniere skills. Nate was nearby chugging champagne, so Tyson went over and tried not to startle him. “You okay?”

“Oh yeah, everything’s great, everything’s changing." Nate put the flute down on a table and smiled tightly at Tyson. "EJ’s getting married, and you and Gabe ran away for Christmas and you _can_ just run away whenever you want because you're retired, and Sid’s probably gonna retire in two years or two concussions, whichever comes first, but sure, everything’s amazing. Couldn’t be better." Nate took a sharp breath and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Can people just be fucking _normal_ for _one day_? We came over for a party! A stupid New Year's party! I'm not emotionally prepared for a wedding!”

“Oh, buddy,” Tyson said as he pulled Nate into a hug. “Yeah, everything’s changing. I’m sorry. That’s how it is. I hate it, too.”

“No you don’t,” Nate said, his voice muffled because his face was buried in Tyson's shoulder. “You found a boyfriend in a crater and he’s so fucking cool and he loves you, and like—I don’t know if I've ever been in love! We're in this wedding and everyone's gonna be asking us which one of us is next and like, I don't know! Do _you_?”

“No one's gonna ask us that because we're guys,” Tyson said. “Come on, it’s EJ’s special day. I knew something was up when he was wearing his teeth and there were no hot dogs on the menu.” Tyson watched Nate for a moment. “You gonna be okay?”

“Yeah.” Nate sighed. “It just sucks. Change sucks. Sorry, it’s black tie, I gotta dress it up: _I would prefer not to_.”

“I know. It’s a lot. Just roll with it. It’s harder when it stops.”

Tyson nudged Nate into the line of people on EJ's side, Tyson at the end and Nate in front of him in case Nate tried to bolt or ruin everything with his quarter-life crisis. The quartet started up the music again as EJ and Jackie came down the makeshift aisle together. Tyson watched, then glanced to the table where he had left Gabe. 

Gabe had turned his seat around and took in everything that was happening—he looked fucking _delighted_. His eyes met Tyson’s and they grinned at each other before Gabe motioned to the proceedings. Tyson turned back to watch EJ very solemnly listening to the officiant and repeating his vows with a real emotion or two in his voice. 

Once EJ and Jackie were married and took all the photos they could possibly demand, Nate and Tyson were released back into the party, both of them making a beeline for their table. The first course was still sitting at their places, Gabe trying not to look too guilty when Tyson arrived to a plate short of some grilled octopus.

"I had asparagus soup," Gabe explained. "Yours was better."

"Hold on, it's my special day, I groomsperson'd all over the place, I should get another octopus," Tyson said.

"Here, take mine, I don't feel like eating," Nate said. "The bar's open, right?"

"Nate, eat something before I kill you," Tyson said.

"What's wrong?" Gabe leaned over Tyson to look at Nate. "There's bread over here. Do you want more bread, Nate?"

"Eat some bread, Nate."

"Can everyone stop saying my name!" Nate yelled. "Holy shit, let me scream into my own hands and get stupid drunk tonight, _thanks_."

"I'm pretty sure bread can solve your problems."

Nate leaned back in his seat and stared up at the ceiling of the tent, hung with beautiful lights and decorations that Tyson knew he wasn't appreciating at all. Tyson shoveled most of the octopus into his mouth, chased it with more champagne, then wrapped his arms around Nate. Their entrees clattered onto the table around them; Tyson hoped Gabe the human vacuum didn't devour his before he had a chance to try it.

"Dogg, what's wrong?" 

"Don't call me that, I know you think that's stupid."

"I love it because it's _you_. Don't tell me what I think."

Nate leaned his head onto Tyson's shoulder. "Am I gonna die alone?"

"What? No! You're twenty-three! You're not gonna die, period." Tyson subtly reached an arm out behind him to flip Gabe off in their mutual sign for _Yes I know I'm lying shut up and let me lie_. Gabe accepted this and gently bit his finger, then Tyson pulled it back to cuddle Nate close again. "Is this because of EJ getting married?"

"EJ gets hurt all the time," Nate said. "He's only thirty but he's got fucking bird bones that snap if he tapes his socks too tight, and they're gonna give me the C as soon as he's done. I'm not ready for that. You just called me Dogg! I can't be CAPTAIN DOGG."

"Are you sure you can't? We can get you a cute little hat and a leash—"

"Tys, never buy me a leash. I can't be the captain with a cute little hat!"

"Maybe EJ never commanded a presence effectively because _he_ didn't have a cute little hat."

"He commands tons of presence, you're just immune to it. Fuck, what if they give me the C and they draft another Tyson Barrie who looks at me and knows I'm full of shit?"

"I haven't been _that_ bad," Tyson protested. "I keep you in check, and I make up for it with how much I believe in you."

Nate exhaled sharply, then turned in the tight circle of Tyson's arms to look right at him. "You believe in me?"

"Nathan MacKinnon, of course I believe in you. How can you ask me that?"

He didn't have an answer for that. Tyson tipped Nate's head back onto his shoulder and rubbed his back soothingly. God, how many times had they done this for each other? Not just in the past year when Tyson needed more support than he thought he would ever get, but in the five years since Nate joined the team?

"You're not gonna die alone," Tyson said. "Drouin's a way more age-appropriate love interest for you, and he's not gonna rub any Stanley Cups in your face."

"That's mean, Sid doesn't do that," Nate said. "And Jo can do anything. Oh, god, what if we both make it to the final one day and I have to fight him for the cup?"

"Uh, you think that'll happen with Montreal?"

"Stop," Nate whined. "Okay, okay, I'm fine, okay?" Nate sat up straight and reached for the roll across from him, tearing it open and shoving both chunks in his mouth. "I'm gonna go hang out with Mikko and Josty."

"Oh, ditching us for the young guys, I see how it is," Tyson said.

"They're my people," Nate said firmly. "We go out and hook up and cry about our crushes from when we were in juniors and how many ugly kids they have now, and we'll probably get a cab to some club later while you and Gabe are drinking champagne in your hot tub and making sure to check on Henry."

"Is there an insult somewhere in there?" Tyson asked. "Like, that sounds cozy as fuck. I wasn't gonna start up the hot tub tonight, but now I kinda want to." Tyson looked over his shoulder. "What do you think? Hot tub when all this is over?"

Gabe considered it, but Nate interrupted by grabbing Tyson's chin. "No, it wasn't an insult! I was asking you to look after my dog! Fireworks make him nervous!"

"Yeah, of course we will," Tyson said. "Sure you're okay? You'll text me, right? Me and only me, and not one of your nine North American hockey boyfriends with a really ill-advised proposal that you'll joke about later?"

"TWO YEARS, TYS. I said we can't joke about that for two years!"

Nate got up and left, so Tyson yelled after him, "PLEASE EAT SOMETHING." Tyson watched him go, then looked to Gabe. "If I ask a waiter to follow him around and make sure he eats at least two entrees—that's like, a hundred, right? For tip?"

"What just happened?" Gabe asked, looking between Tyson reaching for his wallet and Nate joining the young guys across the tent. "Is Nate okay?"

"I hope so," Tyson said. "I kinda want to take his phone because last time he was like this, he drunk dialed... a lot of people? But if he does end up going out with the guys, I think they'll keep him dancing and hydrated enough that I _won't_ get an angry call from Sidney Crosby tomorrow about how I'm not taking good enough care of Nate."

"Can we kidnap him?" Gabe asked. 

"Oh, for sure," Tyson said. "We'll check in before we leave and see if he gets into the car with us to watch some relaxing shit at home. Maybe that yule log with puppies."

"That yule log didn't have enough puppies to advertise itself as a yule log with puppies," Gabe said. "I can get Henry from Nate's place while you wrap him up in ten blankets and don't let him leave."

Tyson smiled at Gabe and kissed him. "We're a good team, right?"

"I think so," Gabe said. "I've never been on a team before."

"Holy shit, you haven't," Tyson said. "Holy shit. We should sign you up for kickball or something. Or maybe a beer league. Do you _want_ to play hockey?"

"You and everyone in this tent have successfully convinced me I never want to play hockey," Gabe replied. "But thank you for offering."

"The Avs do have an adult beginner's clinic or something, if you ever—"

"Tyson, will you dance with me?" Gabe stood up as he asked the question, buttoning his tux again and extending a hand to Tyson. Tyson stared at him, then stood up and smiled. 

"You think you're so sly, you fucker," Tyson said.

"It distracted you just enough to dance with me," Gabe said. "My devious plan kind of ends there."

"Yeah, I respect that," Tyson replied. "Let's eat first, then we can dance, okay?"

"Right, of course. Why didn't you get the polenta? It's amazing."

"Does polenta count as a vegetable?"

"It does not."

Once they were fed and out on the dance floor, the quartet had started playing old standards, which neither Gabe nor Tyson nor anyone under the age of 50 at the party knew how to dance to except by swaying. They did their best, holding each other on the dance floor, hands linked, Gabe eventually pressing his cheek to Tyson's when it didn't seem too cheesy. 

"This is my first wedding," Gabe said. "They're not all this intense, I'm guessing?"

"Ironically, beach weddings take the cake for most intense. The sea can turn on you at any minute." Gabe cracked up. "This is for sure the most casual wedding I've ever attended," Tyson continued. "It makes sense for EJ and Jackie—Jackie's never wanted something big, and EJ pretty much calls her his wife anyway. It's low key. Fewer horses than I expected."

They danced without talking for a few minutes. Gabe eventually straightened up because cheek-to-cheek with Tyson was apparently making him sore. He looked embarrassed enough about it that Tyson didn't even mind his own stature for once— _for once_. They kept dancing, eyes locked on each other. Tyson wondered if the smile on his face looked as chill as Gabe's secretive little half-smile at the corner of his mouth. 

"Did I ever thank you?" Gabe asked.

"What? Thank me? For what, the suit? Dude, you _needed_ a tux. I tell the rookies every year, man, get at least two tuxes. Life here throws a weird number of surprise black tie events at you, sometimes in the same _week_ while the team's all in one place—"

"For everything," Gabe interrupted. 

"Oh. What... everything?"

Gabe's eyebrows crinkled a little, like Tyson was the weird one right now. "For finding me in the forest. Saving my leg. Saving my life. Letting me stay with you. Feeding this _intensely_ needy body everything it needed: food, water, more television than strictly necessary, friendship, lots of time with nice dogs, an inside look into professional sports—" Tyson laughed at that. Gabe's face lightened up a little bit, but he still looked confused. "You're shaking your head. You don't believe me. What?"

"No, I mean, you're welcome?" Tyson said. "But anyone would have done all that stuff. It's just good luck that, you know, I found you and you liked it enough to stay. I'm glad you did."

"Are you kidding me right now?" 

"What?" Tyson asked defensively. 

"You love me," Gabe said. "And people on this planet do terrible, brutal things because they claim they love something. And you—you love me and you're kind to me. You're my friend and my lover and my family, and you let me help you. I can make a difference to you. I do good things with you and for you, and I _help you_. I don't think I could live without that, without you."

Tyson's breath was trapped in his throat, his eyes hot like he was going to burst into tears with a helpless intensity he hadn't felt since he was a kid. Tyson swallowed the lump in his throat and managed to whisper, his eyes firmly fixed on Gabe's shoulder, "Thank you for saying that. I appreciate it."

At that, Gabe laughed and Tyson's eyes flicked up to glare at him. 

"Yeah," Gabe said, sighing as he adjusted his hold on Tyson, his hand on Tyson's back soothing even through the layers of suit. "I don't think you realize how rare kindness is. Here I am, telling you how kind you've been, and I might as well be showing you the molten center of the planet, for all that you can make sense of it."

"No, I _get it_ , I've been nice, I didn't murder you, we're pretty awesome in bed, I get it."

Gabe looked extremely bored. Tyson still wanted to crumble into a thousand pieces, but it was easy to pull himself together when Gabe looked less than perfect. 

"I've been reading a lot since I got here and I found a writer who said if you take the universe and grind it into the finest powder, put it through the finest sieve—"

"The flour thing?"

"Yeah, Tyson. The flour thing. You could do all that with the whole universe and you wouldn't find a particle of justice, or mercy, or kindness. You live and breathe the stuff and you have no idea how rare you are." 

Gabe lifted Tyson's chin, his finger tucked under, and stared right into Tyson's eyes. "Thank you." 

"Why are you saying this now?" Tyson asked. "Are you—like, is your time up? Is this Cinderella? Are you going somewhere?"

Gabe laughed again and dropped his hand so he could pull Tyson close and kiss him firmly. 

"No, you idiot," Gabe said. "I'm telling you this because it's the last night of the year, according to this linear time thing, and I didn't want this incredibly strange time in our lives to end without you hearing that. Thank you."

"Okay," Tyson said. "I believe you, but if anything happens to you in the next 24 hours, I'll hijack NASA and fly to the moon and fire a gun at the first meteor I see."

Gabe smiled. "See? You do love me." 

"Yeah," Tyson said, soft as he could manage. "Yeah, I do." Tyson ran his hand down Gabe's back, resting his hand on the small of his back. "I'm happy, Gabe."

"I'm happy, too." Gabe leaned in, his forehead pressed to Tyson's. "I love you, too. That's what this is, right?"

Tyson shrugged, trying to hide his grin. "Close enough."

"Shut up," Gabe laughed. 

Around eleven, they made their excuses to EJ and Jackie and checked in with Nate.

"Josty's got a lead on something cool downtown with someone from his building," Nate assured Tyson. "Just take my pupster back to your place and tell him I love him and don't let the fireworks scare him too much."

"Did you just call Henry your pupster?" Gabe asked.

"Yeah, I did," Nate said. "What? You wanna fight me?"

"Would that make you feel better?" Gabe asked. "I've never been punched in the face before."

"What? You haven't?" Nate looked up at Gabe, then at Tyson, his eyes welling up with drunk tears. "Why am I living a life where I get punched in the face so much?"

"Oh, god, Nate, please, come back home with us," Tyson said. "We'll start an _Iron Chef_ marathon and you can cuddle Henry and keep us all safe from the fireworks."

"Tyson," Nate pleaded. "Don't let Gabe get punched. Let him... just let him be perfect forever?"

Tyson and Gabe made faces at each other. The other guys at the table, JT and Kerfy and Josty and Mikko and even kind sweet polite Sam Girard, were all looking in other directions like this wasn't happening. Gabe sighed and before Tyson could say anything, he leaned down, threw Nate over his shoulder, and walked out of the party.

"Uh, what the fuck," Tyson asked. "Hey! Don't do that! Gabe! He's heavier than he looks! He's a thickly built boy, Gabe!"

As Tyson hustled after Gabe and a somewhat struggling Nate on his back, EJ ran over and grabbed Tyson's shoulder. "Hey, come on, I've got a wheelbarrow in the shed."

Strangely enough, getting Nate _out_ of the wheelbarrow and sitting upright in the back of Tyson's car was more challenging than Gabe scooping him up in the first place. Nate complained and fought, but eventually he passed out in the backseat, drooling on his own shoulder as Tyson and Gabe struggled to get the seatbelt firmly around him.

"Hey, uh, that was really fucking hot," Tyson told Gabe. "Even if I was terrified the whole time you were gonna throw your back out or something."

"Oh, more injuries to this meat suit, I can't wait," Gabe said. "Thank you, I'm glad you thought it was hot. Has it occurred to you that we're buckling Nate up and driving a total of one thousand feet back to the house?"

"Yeah, I know, but did _you_ want to wheel him back to the house or what?"

"We have to wheel him from the driveway into the house anyway."

"Maybe he'll be awake by then."

"In one thousand feet."

"GOD, SHUT UP," Nate yelled from the back seat. "I'm FINE, I'm just DRUNK, I can walk and seriously, you put me in a _wheelbarrow_? What's PR gonna say about that?!"

"EJ offered!" Tyson buckled himself into the front seat and turned around. "You better thank him next time you see him. I bet if Gabe kept you on his back any longer, you would've puked all over yourself."

"Oh my god, I'm _Canadian_ , I can hold my liquor."

"And I'm too Canadian to tell you how fucking full of shit you are." 

As midnight crept closer, Tyson's living room was decently chill. He had helped Nate change into the sweats he kept in Tyson's guest room for occasions like this, and he and Gabe had watched Nate pass out on the couch for exactly 20 minutes before he woke with a start and wandered off to the guest room, Henry the dog eagerly following him. Tyson turned down the nature documentary he and Gabe were pretending to watch on Netflix, then sat up and cuddled closer to Gabe. They took some time to arrange themselves on the couch, Tyson finally lying between Gabe's legs, his back against Gabe's chest, a throw covering them. 

"I feel seventy years old and I kinda fucking love it," Tyson said. "Like a real cozy grandma."

"Yeah, those are words you said." Gabe's hands idly passed through Tyson's curls, occasionally stopping so he could wrap a curl around his finger. Tyson was still too wired from the evening to sleep at all, but between Gabe and the blanket and the super relaxing voiceover coming from the TV, he was getting there.

"You know the story of how we met?" Gabe asked. "The fake one we've told people about thirty or forty times already?"

"Yeah?"

"Tell me more about it."

"Tell you more about our fake meet-cute?"

Gabe hummed in agreement, Tyson feeling it more than hearing it. "I want to know how you imagined it. Also, you keep saying Worlds like I know what that means."

"Oh! It's a hockey tournament. Every spring, sixteen teams representing different countries duke it out for an ugly trophy. It's the second or third biggest deal in hockey any given year."

"And we met there three years ago."

"Yeah, we played in Prague that year. You have to be invited to play for your national team and it's really hard to break into Team Canada. Nate's gone a bunch of times, I've only been twice. It depends on who's still in the playoffs by the time May rolls around and I'm sorry to tell you that we're usually out of the playoffs so Nate is usually invited."

"Great, now tell me how we met. Didn't meet. Whatever."

Tyson squirmed a little against Gabe, pulling one of Gabe's arms around his waist. 

"Did you think about it at all?" Gabe asked, a little softer.

" _Gabe_ ," Tyson said. "Yeah. I did. I do think about it. I think—okay, so. Sometimes there's upsets, but most years it's Canada, Sweden, and Russia going head-to-head for gold. So in 2015, I was playing for Canada and I imagined that you were friends with someone on the Swedish team. They're called Tre Kronor, by the way. We gotta get you some Tre Kronor gear to back up this web of lies."

"Yes, the merchandising's important. Good thinking."

Tyson kicked Gabe's foot and wrapped his foot around Gabe's ankle as he continued. 

"So you saw me at a game?" 

"Yeah. Like. Maybe Sweden and Canada were playing each other in one of the early rounds. Maybe I was at a Sweden game because hockey players are boring and if I wasn't playing hockey, I wanted to watch hockey. Doesn't matter, point is that I imagined it like, behind the scenes, around the locker rooms. There I am, stupid Tyson Barrie, hanging out in my super obnoxious and super red HOCKEY CANADA gear, and I'm heading towards the Sweden locker room to say what's up to my loser Swede friends, and... there you were."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," Tyson said. "Like... okay, wait, it was three years ago, so you but at Nate's age. Less beard, maybe. Maybe you looked exactly the same and _I_ looked like an underbaked shithead."

"No," Gabe said. "Come on, show me what you looked like then. Underbaked shithead sounds a little harsh."

"Yeah, I don't know how to tell you this, but I've had this face since I was like, fourteen." Tyson scrolled through some albums on his phone, then resorted to looking himself up on google images because his albums were a useless mess. He held up a photo for Gabe, who took his phone and laughed. 

"You were so _cute_. Look at you!"

"There's no difference."

"Yes there is! Maybe it's because they're all action shots, you look very young and surprised in all of them." Gabe handed the phone back, his hand moving back into Tyson's hair. "Okay, so you were adorable and I was a fucking knockout. Then what?"

"No, come on, use your imagination. What would have been embarrassing about you then?"

"I don't know, honestly. Pick something. Bad—oh, it was definitely bad facial hair." Gabe nudged Tyson with his knees until Tyson turned his head slightly and looked up. "When I had been here a week or so, there was a day you were out at appointments and things, so I sat down with YouTube and taught myself how to trim my beard."

"Wait, seriously? I thought you had like, magically known how to do it."

"Of course I didn't! I honestly spent _hours_ watching videos because I knew if I messed it up—"

"It's just hair, Gabe. I wasn't gonna like, throw you out because you shaved off your beard." Gabe was quiet after Tyson said that, so Tyson turned his head again, in time to see Gabe swallow a little awkwardly and look around. "What?"

"I mean, I didn't know that. People do things for all sorts of reasons."

"Gabe," Tyson said softly. "Come on. Come here. Kiss me before I break my fucking neck trying to kiss you first."

Gabe kissed him, right on the nose like a deeply romantic nerd. "It wasn't about you, I just. I didn't know." He cleared his throat again. "So. Prague. You saw me. Then what?"

"Oh, well," Tyson said. "The rest is history." Gabe tugged his hair hard enough to make Tyson yelp. "Christ, okay, okay. So. I saw you, right? And I was as smooth as I always am." 

"Yeah, tell me how smooth."

"You know. Smooth."

"Did I know your name before you jumped on my dick? That kind of smooth?"

Tyson groaned and pulled the throw over his head. "GABE."

"TYSON."

Tyson came out from under the blanket and sighed loudly. "I saw you, all right, and—god, the guys joke that the hotter the guy, the more likely I am to open my mouth and say fucking _anything_ until he gives me his number or sleeps with me."

"Which one was I?"

"Your number, definitely." Tyson smiled to himself as he imagined it. "I would have tried to invite you to the concourse to like, get a beer with me or something, but you would have played hard to get. You'd give me your number and I'd drive myself crazy trying to get to practice _and_ stalk Tre Kronor to see if you were going to be there again. And I'd text you and keep offering: hey, I'll be playing in this game! I'll be at the next Sweden game! I'll be at this party with my boys! I'll show up at your party with your boys!"

"This sounds complicated."

"I was imagining a Romeo and Juliet kind of thing, where you'd lurk outside the Canada locker rooms during intermissions and we'd be really cute. We'd kiss where neither of the teams could see us and when you trusted me, I'd sneak out after curfew and we'd make out somewhere until I had to sneak back to the hotel." 

Gabe chuckled to himself, so Tyson pressed back against his chest a little. Gabe tugged at his hair again. "How did Worlds end? Did you win?"

"Yeah," Tyson said softly. "Yeah, we won. And I'd escape from the team to meet you, and maybe we'd—you know."

"Tenderly make love in a disgusting locker room?"

"You know the trainers' rooms have beds!" Tyson protested. "No, we'd run away to my hotel. I'd tell Nate to stay away, and we would have stayed together the whole night. The next day you would have gone back to Sweden and I would have gone back to Canada, and I'd miss you. I'd miss you so much that I'd call you from Canada and you'd call me from Sweden and we'd be quietly in love with each other all this time."

They were both quiet for a while. Tyson settled a little more against Gabe, turning his head to one side so he could stare at the back of the couch and Gabe's forearm as his hand twisted locks of hair around his fingers. Tyson suddenly felt so overwhelmingly sad at the thought that the story he told Gabe was fiction, that Tyson didn't actually have a tender summer love story to feed what he and Gabe had now. They had _their_ story, their weird wholly improbable mess where a star fell from space and couldn't incorporate enough criminally tight pants into his wardrobe, but this thing Tyson imagined was softer, somehow. He wished he was softer. 

"It wouldn't be a Romeo and Juliet thing," Gabe said. "After I gave you my number, I would have kissed you, so you knew that you had to call me. _Really_ call me. I've seen you promise to call every single person on this team and follow through maybe a third of the time. I would have kissed you to make sure you'd call. Three years ago Gabe might have had bad hair and a sad excuse for a beard, but he would have been a great kisser." Tyson could chirp him for being so fucking smug and sure of himself, but it warmed him all over to hear Gabe talk like that. "And the next time we saw each other, I would have been wearing a Barrie t-shirt, just for you."

"They don't personalize those Team Canada shirts."

"Shut up, it's our fantasy. Ugh, _fine_. I would have bought a Avalanche shirt with your name. Maybe then you would have called me. Maybe you even would have kissed me."

Tyson's watch beeped. It was midnight. They had made it to the new year.

"And somehow, I would have watched all your hockey games back in Sweden. I would have bought your jersey and had it shipped to my very tiny small town in Sweden that burned down in a tragic yule goat fire and where it was so rural I never learned how to drive a car, and... and one day, you would have asked to see me again. And I would have done anything to see you again."

Tyson sat up and turned around so he could lie on top of Gabe, chest to chest with him. He didn't know what his face was doing, but Gabe was staring at him so wistfully, brushing the curls from his forehead. 

"This is sweet, but our real story isn't too bad," Gabe said. 

"No. No, it's not too bad at all." Tyson leaned in and pressed his lips to Gabe's. He tried so hard to make himself gentle and sweet, if only in that one fucking kiss. "Happy new year."

"Happy new year," Gabe repeated, then pulled him in and kissed him again. 

*

The bye week was coming up and the non-dads of the team had yet to make a plan because planning was for dads/suckers. 

"I _just_ surprised you all with a fucking spectacular New Year's Eve wedding you'll remember forever," EJ pointed out at their next post-practice team lunch. "I think I'm allowed to sit back and let you assholes tell me where we're going for the bye week. Also, I'm the captain, so make it good or we're taking a road trip to visit my horse children." 

"What did they tell you about getting attached to them?" Tyson asked. 

"That Uncle Tyson should shut his mouth because he doesn't understand my love for my babies," EJ replied. "That's what the horses told me."

Tyson stared at him, then shrugged. "Anyway, what about Hawaii? It's only eight hours."

"Oh my god, veto," EJ said. "That's _so_ many time zones. Dude, we have to come back and play hockey. Like, no offense."

"It's a good point," Tyson said. "I dunno, maybe Gabe and I will go there and you guys go wherever. Like, you're right, it doesn't make sense for you guys to go that far for less than a week since—"

"Wait, you won't come with us?" Nate interrupted. 

"Oh no," Comphy whispered. "Oh shit, is it happening now? Who had money on after the new year?"

"Shut up," Nate said, more abashed about it than Tyson would have liked. "Like, whatever. Tyson can go wherever he wants."

"We've never been to Hawaii," Tyson said. "And we'll be back for that first roadie to... wherever the fuck we're going. Washington?"

Grubi nodded at Tyson. "And Hawaii's not a bad idea. The way the league fucked with the bye weeks, half the teams are going one week and half the other. We'll probably see half the guys in the league in Cancún that week."

"Also, you guys always go to Cancún," Josty said. 

"I don't see why everyone's hating on Cancún all of a sudden," Nate said. "Cancún is reliable. Cancún never changes, it doesn't go anywhere. I'm going to Cancún. I've earned it."

"Yeah you have, Mr. Central Division All-Star Captain," EJ laughed. 

"Why can't they ever send anyone else," Nate moaned. "There's all of you assholes still here. Can I just get a vacation?"

"That's the kind of sloth and maturity that the guys with families would welcome in the Keys," Calvert said. 

"You just want a free babysitter," Nate said.

"I say this with a lot of love in my heart," Calvert began. "I would never leave my kids alone with you. They would destroy you. Cole Harbour's thick-necked hockey breeding stock would never forgive me."

"I hate _everyone_ on this team," Nate announced. He looked across the table at Tyson, this time pleading. "You're really gonna leave me alone with them? You're gonna skip _Cancún_?"

"Your Cancún fixation's only selling me on Hawaii more," Tyson replied. 

"#BestFriendsCanceled," Nate said.

"We can go to Hawaii again in the off season!"

"You know, there are _other_ beaches in the world," EJ interrupted. "Not that Cancún isn't the pinnacle of everything our beloved Nate Dogg loves in a vacation, but it's good to expand your horizons."

"Not the same week I have to be a stupid All-Star captain," Nate said. "What if it's like when Sid was the captain and everyone liked Ovechkin more than him?"

EJ considered this. "Well, Ovechkin's not going and you have a personality, so it's not really a problem. Everyone's gonna love you, baby."

"I'm going to take care of you and make sure everyone likes you," Mikko chimed in. 

EJ pointed at Mikko as he looked at Nate. "Now you've got Mikko worried! He's your linemate-son! Tell him the All-Star Game is fun and he has nothing to worry about!"

Nate did no such thing. "It's exhausting. Everyone wants you to have fun all the time, all the activities are stupid, the music's always blasting, and like. God. There's all this pressure to be funny. I'm a meatloaf who shoots a puck good. Leave me alone." 

"You should show up to the skills competition with like, a Kindle and reading glasses and a glass of port," Tyson laughed. "Everyone loves prop comedy. Ooh, pretend you're on _Frasier_. That'll get you through the weekend."

Nate stared at Tyson like he was at the bottom of his own personal hell. Tyson reached across the table and squeezed his hand. "It'll be okay."

"Why am I being punished for being good at hockey?" Nate asked.

"It's true, you should be bad at it," Tyson said. "That worked out really well in The Season of Which We Do Not Speak."

"You should bring Gabe to the All-Star Game," Nate said. "Roman will be there. Ryan, too!"

"Ooh, so Tyson can parade his man in front of his exes, I like it," EJ said. "If it was literally anywhere but the All-Star Game, I'd totally support that. However, Nate's desperation makes me sad and it might be contagious, so I veto." EJ reached over Girard and clapped Tyson on the shoulder. "Go to Hawaii, don't think about any of us."

"Is anyone— _anyone_ —coming to Cancún with me?" Nate asked. 

Tyson leaned over to look at EJ. "But he's so sad."

"MacKinnon!" EJ barked. "Stop being sad!" 

"Wait, an appeal," Nate said. "Gabe's never been to Cancún, either."

"Gabe's never been anywhere!" Tyson said.

"Yeah, how is that?" EJ asked. "I thought Swedes were like, super well-traveled and blah blah blah Europe loves trains."

"He's from a really small town," Tyson said. "Like. Super small."

"All the more reason to get the fuck out, via train or goat or whatever means possible," EJ said. 

"Gabe caught us up, actually," Nemo interrupted. Tyson tried to keep his eyes from falling out of his head, focusing his panic on Nate first before switching over to Nemo and Soda, quietly hanging out a few seats down from Nate and Josty. "Tyson's useless and kept saying 'a small town' and 'a farm town', but Gabe's actually from this really tiny province near the Arctic Circle."

"Hang on, what the _fuck_ ," Josty said. "Gabe's from the _North Pole_? Is Tyson fucking _Santa_?"

"I know that's supposed to be a joke," Soda said carefully, "But I'm going to tell you the North Pole is about two thousand miles from the Arctic Circle. However, that doesn't mean Tyson's _not_ fucking Santa."

"Tyson's in a committed monogamous relationship with Santa, thank you."

"Guys, we should take like, an arctic cruise one day," Josty said.

Comphy nudged Josty's side. "You know you can just ask for cuddles, you don't have to drag me on a fucking arctic cruise to keep you warm."

"Who said it was about you! Who said it was about cuddling! Maybe I just want to wear a big coat and look at some ice."

"Oh my god, you're a _hockey player_."

"So wait, like, I only know hockey geography," EJ said to Nemo, changing the subject for the eighth or ninth time. "Soda's from way down in the south, right? And you're from Stockholm. The Sedins are from... somewhere with water. I can keep naming Swedes so please interrupt me before I embarrass myself."

"It's not _that_ far north, but I can't think of anyone as north as Gabe," Soda said thoughtfully. "The friend he followed to Prague had left their town to try and make the national team and when he did, he took Gabe with him out of the country for the first time."

"Holy shit," EJ said. "More goats than people kinda town?"

"Really beautiful, really boring," Soda confirmed. 

"I'd almost say _Like Gabe_ but I think my tongue would fall out of my mouth from the lies," EJ said. "Damn, why didn't he tell us?"

"Because it's weird and he didn't want to be weird?" Nemo suggested.

"He's gotta be a little weird to put up with this guy, maybe even _super_ weird," EJ said, reaching over Girard to muss up Tyson's hair and get his hand slapped for it. 

At some point, Tyson thought, he might feel guilty about lying to EJ, who was actually one of his best friends; Tyson just wasn't there yet. Tyson looked at Nemo and Soda and nodded, hoping his eyes said _thank you_ when he couldn't.

"Damn, Tys, that's even more romantic," Josty said across the table. "You were like, the first guy he met outside his village or whatever, and he totally fell for you."

"I get the relationship now," Comphy said. "Poor guy doesn't know any better."

"Shut up, I'm serious!" 

"Don't worry, Josty, some day your curly haired shit-talking prince will come."

Tyson laughed along with them, but he kept watching Nate, who had been withdrawn from the conversation since EJ had yelled at him. Nate finally caught him looking; Tyson raised his eyebrows at him, but Nate looked away and picked at his lunch some more. Luckily, lunch didn't last much longer, once they reached a tentative agreement that for this year's stupidly rushed and badly planned bye week, everyone would fend for themselves and EJ would wear beach trunks in his backyard in the snow with a bucket of Coronas at his side. As everyone picked up their trash and started to leave, Tyson carefully took Nate by the elbow and led him away.

"You okay?" Nate shook his head. "Because of Cancún?"

"Everything, man. Like, I dunno. It's always us, you know? And now—"

"I know."

"Not that Gabe isn't awesome! But, like. He doesn't have a full season schedule." Nate was, honest to fuck, scuffing his shoes as he tried to talk to Tyson. All Tyson wanted to do was pull him into a suffocating bear hug and make everything okay. "He can go places with you, you know? And you're—like, I was just thinking the two of you are in the same place, right? Like, ready to start something bigger, and I'm still here."

"You remember that _still here_ is alternate captain of an NHL team, right?" Tyson asked. "Literally one of the best jobs in the entire universe."

"I know, but you were supposed to be here with me." Nate looked away and rubbed his sleeve against his eyes. "And, yeah, best job in the world, I know—"

"Universe," Tyson repeated. "Remember, we have confirmation that space is cold, empty, and kinda sad in its overwhelming scope and loneliness, so it's universe for now."

Nate laughed a little. "Yeah, best job in the universe. What am I gonna do with myself, though?"

"Wrong person to ask," Tyson said. "Gabe's gonna fight a saucepan and make risotto for early dinner and my only responsibility is _do something to make chicken taste good_ and there's too many options to consider. It's okay, though. I'm gonna buy a fucking chicken, and you've got time to figure yourself out."

"You did, too. You _thought_ you did."

Tyson sighed. "Stop arguing with me, just accept I'm right and you're gonna have the best fucking time in Cancún, _safely_ partying with the other guys and _safely_ picking up as much as you want."

"You were suplexed onto a salad dish and almost lost your leg. I don't think you're allowed to tell me how to vacation."

"Uh, vacation smarter. Obviously. Less blood. No blood at all." Tyson yawned and put his arm around Nate. "Come on, you've gotta take a nap and I've gotta hit up the supermarket."

"Can't believe you're gonna have a responsible dinner at home with your boyfriend instead of a second calorie-fest with the boys," Nate said. "What a difference some tender loving dick makes."

"He might totally fuck up this risotto and we might end up eating with you guys," Tyson said. "Gabe's only doing it because everyone on Food Network complains all the time about how hard it is to make risotto, so it's mostly out of spite."

"You legally have to bring me some spite risotto when you drive us to the game tonight."

"If it's good, I'm gonna have to stop Gabe from running over and interrupting your nap to make you taste it."

Nate laughed and looked a little cheered, but there was still some sadness tugging at him. Tyson felt it, too. They had been NateandTyson for so long that this stung at him, too. A part of him _did_ want to go to Cancún and their usual overcrowded resort with a dozen swim-up bars where he could get hit on by sleazy dudes with bad spray tans—

But another part of him wanted Gabe to himself, in a place neither of them had ever been before, experiencing shit together and getting lost together. He couldn't help imagining Gabe's ridiculous smile the first time he stepped on a white sand beach and into the bluest water either of them had ever seen in the Pacific Ocean. 

"We're still #BestFriends, right?" Tyson asked. 

"We better be," Nate said. "Avs PR kinda has a lot riding on that one hashtag."

"Great, we're back to normal."

Nate sighed. "Yeah, Tys, we're still #BestFriends."

"We're gonna be okay," Tyson decided. "You hear that, Nathan? We're gonna be okay."

"Okay," Nate said. "Okay, I believe you."

*

Tyson had long, _long_ perfected the art of sneaking out of the house in the middle of the night. The trick was to move at normal speed _in_ the house, then double-time and bolt once he was outside. _That's Tyson just slipping out of bed to get some more water from downstairs_ , someone might think, and the car pulling out of the driveway sounded close but oh, look at that, whoever was listening for Tyson had already fallen back to sleep. 

That was what Tyson told himself every time he drove to the practice rink in the middle of the night. Why wouldn't he tell himself that, believe that? Nate kept him company at night for months, months when Tyson was sneaking out to skate at the practice rink as often as his knee let him, and he only told Tyson to be careful, call if he needed something, but never as Tyson was actually leaving the house. 

And Gabe?

Gabe had to know, even if Tyson was sneaking out less and less.

"Don't stay too long," the security guard on the night shift warned Tyson. "They've got an early day tomorrow." Tyson nodded and offered a tiny smile as he walked by with just his skates and a stick. 

Tyson was beach trash through and through—he loved summer, shorts hanging off his hips, throwing himself into the ocean. He loved being a shirtless guy wondering how he could make out with other shirtless guys, spending every night with a drink in his hand at a table with his friends, laughing through the longest sunsets of the year and into warm nights that never ended. Tyson's favorite summer nights were the ones where he managed to snag a halfway decent fuck, someone nice who wouldn't mind Tyson cleaning them up and staying out all night on the beach or the lawn or _wherever_ , just breathing in summer with him and holding him until the sun came up. Fuck, Tyson couldn't wait to do that with Gabe when it was summer, _real_ summer. 

Fuck, did Tyson forget about all that when faced with a sheet of ice. 

He sat on the bench, laced up his skates, taped his stick, set the stick aside, then leaned forward so he could rest his chin on his folded hands and stare at the ice. It had been cleaned since it was last used, probably some beer league practice or community engagement thing the team organized. Tyson sat there and breathed in the cold, imagined how _amazing_ the sound of his skates on the ice would sound, and felt his throat swell at the thought of this becoming a rare occurrence, a fun occurence, and not _his fucking life_. When the pressure behind his eyes got to be too much, he blinked the tears away and grabbed his stick, finally stepping out onto the ice. 

"Fuck, I love this," Tyson said conversationally as he warmed up with some laps. Beaches were awesome, summer was awesome, but the chill crept into his nose and down his throat—it was so much, it was all so much. "Fuck, I _love this_ ," Tyson said, his voice a little lower, closer to a growl in his chest, too much feeling behind it all. If this was his inspirational sports movie, what was the song playing in this montage as he skated softer versions of their practice drills, as he raced in circles just to make his thighs burn, as the sweat cooled on his hair and made him shiver? Something sad? Something good, something motivational? A training-building-momentum montage or a momentum-then-failure-the-success-is-just-a-little-further montage? Why didn't he know? Why did he only know that he loved this and he couldn't live without it? What kind of name could he make for himself, what kind of life could he build out of this?

Eventually, he stopped. He stopped doing laps, he stopped doing drills, he stopped and he cooled down. He skated back to the bench and sat down. He rested his forehead against the ledge and took a moment to catch his breath, the cold so fucking good in his chest and on his skin. He sat up after a minute, stared out at the ice again, then changed back into his boots and headed home. 

This time, Tyson didn't sneak back into the house. He let himself in, struggled out of his boots, grabbed a bottle of water from the kitchen, and headed upstairs to bed. He cracked open the bottle before he let himself into the bedroom and shut the door behind him. Gabe was asleep, but not sound asleep—his breathing was too quick and Tyson thought he saw him crack an eye open as Tyson was taking long gulps of water by the door. He climbed into bed, turning his back to Gabe, tucking the covers around him and his hands under his long-sleeved shirt to warm his hands. 

Behind him, Gabe shifted, his breathing too awake again. Tyson felt a hand reach out and touch his waist, then into his shirt searching for his hands. There was a little tug, so Tyson sighed and turned to his other side, his hands still under his shirt, though he pressed closer to Gabe. 

"Yeah, you smell like ice, and the rink, and sweat," Gabe said, his eyes still half-closed. 

"Sorry," Tyson said.

"Why?" Before Tyson could answer, Gabe yawned huge and pulled the covers closer over them. He reached again for Tyson's hands, either of them, and pulled one close, pressing it to his collarbone. "This feels so nice."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. Are your hands cold?"

"Sorta. I know they feel cold, but I'm not cold."

"Okay, well, if you want to warm them up against me, I won't complain."

He didn't, not really, because the cold didn't bother him, but he did like how Gabe arched when he pressed his other hand to the other side of Gabe's neck. 

"Gabe?" Tyson asked, so quiet. "I think I want to coach. Hockey, obviously, and like, for real. Get certified and stuff." He cleared his throat and pushed his face closer to Gabe, and Gabe moved back a little, adjusted everything until they were sharing the same pillow. Tyson tucked his face close, looking down at his hands on Gabe's chest, his warmth seeping into Tyson's skin, their bodies side-by-side. 

"I think I'd be good at it," Tyson added. "My junior coaches made me so miserable, all of them assholes who let everyone get away with murder because that's hockey, you know. I just. I think I could be good at it, like, winning without destroying anyone. God, I'll just write that on the certification form, I guess. _Let's get out there and win without destroying anyone, eh boys?_ " When Tyson glanced up, Gabe was listening and smirking. "And I can be on the ice. I thought it would hurt more, being on the ice but not playing like I used to play on it, but—god, I _need_ to be on the ice. I need to keep coming back to it. I can't leave it."

"Do you think you want to coach up to this level? Your level?" Gabe finally asked. "I've only been listening to hockey gossip for some months now, but it sounds like your stupid league keeps cycling through the same 10 men as head coaches."

"God, maybe? Maybe I could make it better? Everything in this league and this sport sucks so fucking much. If I can make it better, shouldn't I? Not that it's gonna happen before I'm old and I've pulled out all my hair, but. It doesn't sound so bad now." Tyson let his head sink a little more into the pillow, hoping his face disappeared further out of Gabe's line of vision. "Does that sound stupid?"

"What, a hockey player deciding he wants to help people play better hockey? What part of that sounds stupid?"

"Okay, when you say it like that."

"It's not stupid," Gabe said. "Do this as long as you want. Maybe it's the thing you do forever. Maybe it's one of the things you do for a while. I'll be here."

Tyson hummed in agreement and tried to bury the terror of _having made an actual decision_ by pressing his cheek against Gabe's chest. 

"And I passed my written driver's test, so maybe I can drive you to and from practices. Mikko said I could bring orange slices for the guys, whatever that—"

Tyson sat up immediately and looked down at Gabe. "You took the written test? You passed it? What the fuck! Why did you wait to tell me until five-thirty in the morning?!"

Gabe laughed at him and shrugged. "I was waiting for a funny set up and it just didn't happen. We had a pretty boring night, Tys."

"Shut up," Tyson laughed. "I'm proud of you." 

"I'm proud of me, too." Gabe beamed. "And EJ says he has a beat up old car that I can borrow for practice."

"God, he fucking would." Tyson leaned in to kiss Gabe, then settled back on his pillow. It didn't last long, Gabe resting a hand on Tyson's waist and pulling him closer until they were almost on the same pillow again. "We'll get you a driving instructor who has the blood pressure low enough for a new driver whose prior motor vehicle experience is, I dunno, _gravity_."

"Really good point," Gabe considered. "I'll drive you to practice several years from now."

Tyson agreed, trying not to laugh before he gave up and let Gabe kiss him again. The sky was beginning to lighten outside their windows, just as they settled back into bed, Gabe's skin steadily glowing and Tyson lightly clasping Gabe's hand. 

*

January brought a long stretch of home games with the ASG and the bye week right after. EJ offered his free time and the promised beat-up giant sedan to help Gabe practice his driving, which freed up a lot of mornings and early evenings for Tyson.

"Did you talk to your therapist about how you're like, physically incapable of being alone?" Nate asked, both of them cuddled under a warm throw on Nate's couch, catching up on a new show featuring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and his gladiator children. 

"I don't hear you complaining," Tyson said. "That doesn't count as a complaint."

"Nah, I'm just—"

"Weren't you just saying we don't hang out enough anymore?"

"Yeah, because we went from 28 hours a day together to 24, that didn't mean _bring it back up to 28_."

"Shit, you made me miss the beginning of the mountain, come on, go back!"

"And why does your phone keep buzzing? Is Gabe texting while driving?"

While Nate found their place in the episode, Tyson checked his phone again.

"It's just EJ with updates," Tyson answered. "Apparently Gabe and I don't eat enough vegetables so he's making Gabe drive to some super organic market somewhere."

"That's _hilarious_ ," Nate said. "Why doesn't EJ care about me like he cares about you guys?"

"Don't worry, I'll tell him your fridge is suffering, too."

Gabe texted when the driving lesson ran from catching up on Hulu to starting a season of _Property Brothers_ Tyson and Nate hadn't watched before. 

_We're in rush hour traffic downtown. Have dinner without us._

"Huh," Tyson said, showing his phone to Nate. 

"Probably one of EJ's hyperrealistic driving simulations, otherwise known as, _yeah we're gonna sit in rush hour traffic for a while_."

"There's a hundred people in the city of Denver at any given time. I'm surprised they managed to _find_ traffic."

"Or they're having secret fancy handsome man dinner without us," Nate replied.

"That's a lot more plausible. Those assholes." Tyson sighed deeply. "Okay, I'm gonna... fucking feed us, I guess."

"Do you need me to take off my shirt, put on an apron, and breathe heavily in your ear or something?"

"Okay, _maybe_ you're over at our house too much? Anyway, fuck you. Put on one of your fun podcasts so I don't get bored and burn everything."

Tyson’s phone buzzed again some time later, after he and Nate had eaten and made an effort to have leftovers for someone, anyone.

_Are you at Nate's?_

_yes and you better have ice cream bc nate doesn't have ANYTHING_

A minute later, EJ and Gabe walked through Nate's door. Tyson peeked out from the kitchen and beamed when he saw Gabe holding a bag from a quirky old timey ice cream place that he hadn't even told Gabe about. The internet was a miracle and so was Gabe.

"Did you get me an ice cream sandwich because I love ice cream sandwiches?" Tyson asked as he emerged from the kitchen.

"Uh," EJ interrupted. "Gabe's from space?"

Tyson stopped in his tracks. Nate dropped a pan he had been rinsing, swore, then swore a few more times as he dried his hands and came out into the living room to stand next to Tyson and stare at EJ and Gabe. 

"Why didn't you tell me?" EJ asked. 

Tyson opened his mouth, then closed it again. He had almost, _almost_ found the words, some truths and some lies to smooth things over with EJ, when Gabe spoke.

"It wasn't his story to tell," Gabe said. 

Tyson… was not expecting that.

"I figured he would tell Nate because they share a fucking brain cell," EJ said. 

"Tyson wanted to keep me safe," Gabe said. "But it's my story and I wanted to tell you." 

EJ looked mollified, but he still shot a quick glare at Tyson. "I wasn't gonna sell your boyfriend to the government like in the fish dude movie."

Nate muttered, "We really need to see another movie at some point."

"I didn't think you were!" Tyson said. "Anyway, listen to him, he's—yeah, he's right. His story, his rules."

EJ nodded. He shoved his hands deep in his pockets and looked down at the floor. 

"...can we have ice cream now?" Tyson asked.

"Christ, Tyson," EJ said.

"What more do you want, man!"

"Can I have like, _five seconds_ to process this?"

"You had rush hour to process it," Gabe announced. "Tyson wants ice cream."

Gabe stepped around EJ and put his arm around Tyson, gentle and casual around his neck. Tyson reached into the bag and found an ice cream sandwich, then leaned up and kissed Gabe before they crashed into Nate's dining room table and sat down next to each other. 

Nate, for the most part, looked torn between joining them at the table and... whatever was going on with EJ. It took another moment, but Nate sighed again and pulled EJ to the table for ice cream. 

"Where's all the vegetables you promised?" With his free hand, Tyson was pawing through the bag of stuff from the ice cream place, picking out the stuff he would take back to their place and letting Nate and EJ fight for the shitty flavors they could fit into their diet plans. 

"They're at home, and we're really going to use them," Gabe said confidently. "Lots of greens."

"Can't wait to make a fucking smoothie out of them."

"No, we're going to eat those fucking leaves, I promised EJ."

"So, like," EJ interrupted again. "You weren't alive four months ago."

Gabe shrugged. "I was, sort of. I was conscious, but I didn't have a body."

"So... all stars are alive."

"I mean, _everything's_ alive."

EJ didn't look happy about that. The ice cream wasn't really helping, but then, that was EJ. 

"What'd you talk about in the car?" Tyson asked, aiming so, so hard for nonchalant. Gabe, just to be infuriating, sucked on his spoon and smirked at Tyson. EJ cleared his throat again, so they paid attention again. 

"So, all this. Is this—it's real, right?" EJ looked at his hands, almost afraid to look at Tyson. "Because I—Gabe said it was real, but I just have to hear it from you, too. That—"

"Yeah, man," Tyson said. "It's real."

EJ met Tyson's eyes and looked so upset that Tyson put down his ice cream.

"You were so scared," EJ said slowly. "You were so alone that you—you got in your car and had to chase a meteor into the mountains? I’m sorry, man. I’m sorry we weren’t there for you." EJ shook his head and looked at Nate. “I’m sorry I didn’t help you out more. It’s—you’re just a kid, Mack.”

“I’m not,” Nate said. “I knew what I was doing.”

“We’re a fucking team. We take care of each other, not _Nate and Tyson Take Care of Everyone and Let Themselves Fall Apart_. I hate that show. Fucking canceled. We have to take care of each other.”

Tyson didn't know what to say to that.

"And what if it wasn't Gabe?" EJ looked at Tyson again. "What if—"

"Dude, I know," Nate interrupted. "But it _was_ Gabe, and that's what matters. They found each other."

"In the insanest! Possible! Way!" EJ said. "Like, am I _losing it_ right now? Tys, what if—"

"Yeah, I know, we can't _all_ meet the love of our lives in a bar and get so lucky that—"

"It was a bookstore back when we still had bookstores!"

Something clattered, Gabe's spoon against the table. 

"Why is it insane?" Gabe asked. "An asteroid knocked me to Earth and Tyson found me. That's as lucky as you meeting Jackie in a bookstore."

"Holy shit, no it's not!" EJ snapped. "It's absolutely not, it's—"

"That little story about Worlds," Gabe interrupted. "How many things have to click into place, so many things more believable to you? That a nobody like me knows someone on the Swedish team. That I'm close enough to this guy that he wouldn't mind me coming to the dressing room to hang out after the game. That Tyson wasn’t sight-seeing that day, that he came to watch two random countries play each other. That Tyson _also_ knew someone on the team, well enough to come hassle them. That when Tyson decided to drop by, I would still be standing there. That I was looking at Tyson, and Tyson was looking at me. That I spoke English! That I was in the mood to get picked up, or that Tyson was in the mood to pick up!"

"Okay, when is he not, though," Nate said.

Gabe nodded. "That part, yeah, write it off."

"Fuck all of you," Tyson replied automatically, but his heart wasn't in it. Instead his heart was in his throat, Gabe building up something that Tyson did and didn't understand, something that felt so big and made him feel so small, but not in a bad way. His life was wild and impossible and he had spent so long not seeing that. He spent so long without feeling that he was alive and needed and _wanted_ in a wild and impossible universe. Gabe was bright and warm, but he didn't fix anything. _What do stars do_ , Gabe liked to joke. Stars weren't magic, they didn't fix things—they shine.

And this one had fallen and found Tyson and they had helped each other to whatever this was. Knees touching under the table. Chocolate sweet and sticky on Tyson's lips. Their friends, loving and worrying them. All their hearts beating, steady and sure. 

Tyson took another bite of his ice cream sandwich. "You okay?" he asked EJ.

EJ stared at Gabe. "Is space why you sound so fucking _Canadian_?"

"What?" Gabe asked. He looked to Tyson, wide-eyed. "Is that what I sound like?"

"I dunno, I didn't really notice." Tyson dug into his ice cream again and thought about it. "I guess? You sound like us."

"Speak for your fucking selves," EJ said. "Some real effective camouflage, landing in a pile of hockey players with a _flawless_ Ontario accent."

Gabe finally reached across the table to steal EJ's ice cream; he had his hand slapped, _really_ hard, and snatched it back twice as quick. "What the fuck!"

"I need this," EJ said. "I bared a _lot_ of my soul just now—"

"Uh, you didn't. My soul, my ice cream."

"My money."

"Tyson, buy his ice cream off him." Gabe thought about it for a moment, then reached into Tyson's pocket and pulled out his wallet.

"Okay, this isn't—you can just Venmo him."

"Yeah, Venmo me, asshole," EJ said as he poured his sad half-melted ice cream into his mouth. 

Tyson looked across the way at Nate, who was thoughtfully staring at his ice cream. "Are _you_ okay?"

"Why didn't anyone notice Gabe didn't sound Swedish?" Nate asked. "Are we just like... really stupid?"

"Yeah," Tyson said. "Yeah, we're really stupid. Except Carl. Carl knew."

"Who the fuck is Carl?"

*

_are you guys watching_

_lol yes_

_wait what time is it there???_

_4_

_am????_

_dude hawaii is 2hrs behind pst_

_but it took you 8 hrs to fly there_

_nate_

_k thx i know nothing about anything_

_nate your second job is being flown around the country every week_

_i sleep the whole time!!!!!! i like plane naps!!!!_

 

"Everything okay?" Gabe asked.

"Nate's really smart for a hockey player," Tyson said. "He'll try and tell you otherwise, but he's really smart."

"I believe you."

They had been in Hawaii for a few days already, staying at a beachside resort with enough cabanas even for Jamie's taste. The beach was minutes away and so beautiful that Gabe temporarily forgot he wasn't a morning person so he could join Tyson early in the morning for a walk along the water as the sun rose. 

They'd immediately go back to bed after that, but it was a pretty nice start to their mornings. They had coffee on the balcony of their room and fucked like they were the only people on Earth (they super weren't, but no complaints yet). 

Coverage of the All-Star Game started and once all the bullshit intros were done, they started seeing glimpses of Nate and Mikko at the skills competition, Nate buzzing around and bumping shoulders with guys all over.

"I want Mikko to talk to more guys and make more friends," Gabe said. "I don't even know what they're competing for—is it friendship?"

"I love you so much," Tyson said. He picked up his feet and leaned into Gabe's side, letting Gabe wrap an arm around him as they watched the nonsense. 

 

_you're watching?????_

_YES_

 

Cameras between events were so shaky they were nauseating, with either camera guys running after players or the newest active cameras strapped onto players for fun, so it took Tyson a minute to realize Nate was skating over to Sid so they could pose in front of one of the cameras and hold up their shitty little sign _TYSON BARRIE 4 ALL STAR 2020_.

"Nate's ridiculous," Gabe said. "You're already an all star."

"You're both ridiculous," Tyson laughed. He sat up so he could quickly take a photo of the TV and text it to Nate with all the nice emojis in the world. "Oh, and that's Sid."

" _That's_ Sid?" Gabe asked. "He's not what I expected."

"Yeah, he does that."

 

_you assholes lol_

_miss you t-bear. hawaii nice???? cros might be interested if you guys wanna go back and get a house. he heard sand is great for getting more out of morning runs_

_it's fucking sand. stop making the beach homework!!!! fuck you sid_

 

The camera was still on Nate and Sid, because it was NBC Presents Nate and Sid. Sid glanced at Nate's phone, laughed, and turned to the camera so he could wave directly at Tyson, like a dick. 

Tyson sat back on his heels and switched back to his camera. Gabe glanced at him from the end of the couch, but Tyson waved him off so he resumed his Natural Pose. It was still a bright, warm day outside, Gabe leaning on his hand as he watched the TV, illuminated by that light. After a few clicks, Gabe glanced over and smirked at Tyson, so fucking cool Tyson didn't know what to do with himself but lean in and kiss him. He sent the photo off to Nate to show just how nice Hawaii was, then leaned against Gabe again so they could watch the skills competition until it became the snorefest it always was. 

*

The team took a relatively quick road trip to the East Coast in mid-February, so Tyson took Gabe and went west to Vancouver for some meetings Tyson had set up Regarding His Future and His Career and, also, his family. 

"I can't believe you're not staying with us while you're here," his mom sighed. He and Gabe had just walked in, were still standing in his parents' living room while his mom's arm clutched Gabe's bicep as she spoke to Tyson. "We barely see you anymore and we don't know Gabriel at _all_." She looked up at Gabe and smiled. "Look how _handsome_ he is."

"Yeah, I think so," Tyson said. "Come on, let him breathe."

"You see how he bosses people around," his mom told Gabe. "Don't let him do that to you! You tell him what's what and put him in his place."

Gabe stared at her, then burst out laughing and looked at Tyson. Tyson's hackles were permanently up around his family, but he relaxed a little at Gabe's laugh. If _Gabe_ could see what a fucking farce this was, then maybe it would be okay. 

Tyson glanced around at his dad and Victoria, who was standing off to the side with her arms crossed over her chest. "What?" Tyson asked.

"I still can't believe you got someone that hot," Victoria said. "Is this one of those Rent-a-Boyfriend things so we'd get off your back?"

"Of course he's real, Victoria," Tyson's dad laughed. "Real in need of citizenship."

Tyson took a step closer as Victoria laughed and his dad looked really proud of himself. "He can hear you," Tyson hissed. "Knock it off."

"Oh, lighten up, Tys," his dad said. "He should be grateful he found someone like you to latch on to when you were just a kid."

"He's younger than me!"

Tyson's dad sighed. "Anyway, your mother said we should feed you two, so go bring over the Timmies from the kitchen, make yourself useful." 

The couple of hours Tyson and Gabe spent with Tyson's family wasn't the worst, by Tyson's standards. His parents and Victoria happily interrogated Gabe, who disappointed them with every answer. 

"What kind of Swede doesn't play hockey?" Tyson's dad asked.

"This one," Gabe said. "It wasn't a big part of my life growing up."

"Makes no goddamned sense."

"Tyson taught me how to skate!" Gabe said.

"Oh, did he? Well isn't that nice of Tyson," his mom said.

"We always said he should be a figure skater because he was so light on his feet," Victoria said. "Oh my god, Tys, that's not a gay thing! You're just really small and fast! God, you're such a fucking baby."

Eventually, Tyson reminded them he and Gabe had dinner plans and should get going. Gabe had asked earlier if he was going to mention the coaching plans to his family while they visited, and Tyson tried very hard not to laugh as he told him no, they wouldn't be discussing that with his family until things settled more than they were.

"Come back and visit us soon, baby," Tyson's mom said as she hugged him tightly. "And call us sometimes! Do you at least text Victoria more than you text us?"

"Mom, you've gotta get on Instagram to know anything about Tyson's life, he's just not a big texter," Victoria said. 

"Oh, I have an account and I never know how to use it. Tyson, you can send me pictures!"

"Sure, Mom," Tyson said. 

Tyson's dad came over and pulled Tyson into a quick hug. "You take care of yourself and that boy."

"Sure, Dad."

They broke apart and his dad looked over Tyson's shoulder again, somewhere in the vicinity of where he had left Gabe. "He seems like a good fit for you."

That surprised him. "Yeah. Yeah, he is."

"He's not all—"

"Okay, don't push it," Tyson said. "I get it, thanks, Dad."

Victoria reached over and tousled Tyson's hair. "I have a business trip in Boulder next month so the three of us should get dinner."

"We should," Tyson said. "Depends on the team's schedule and all that."

"One meal with your sister, dick."

Tyson smiled. "We'll see!"

Back in the rental car, Gabe drove them back to the hotel and waited until they were well on the way back downtown before he laughed and clenched the wheel a little tighter. 

"You know..."

Tyson nodded. "Yeah, I know."

"You're not going to become like that when you're older, are you? You're not luring me in with all this kindness before you turn rotten inside and think jokes at other people's expense are the height of comedy?"

"I sure fucking hope not," Tyson said. "Just kill me if that happens."

"Tyson."

"It's fine. If I didn't talk to them or see them once in a while, I'd almost think I was making it up for attention or something."

"You're not," Gabe said. 

There was a lull in their conversation, Gabe driving steady and excellent, only a little paranoid and tense every time a car came too close to them. 

"How does Nate stand them?" Gabe asked. "He said your two families had Christmas together every year."

"I mean, that's why we have Christmas together every year," Tyson said. "More people, more buffers, you know? It was his idea. I didn't _want_ to inflict them on him."

Gabe was quiet again for a while. Tyson could see Gabe was thinking things through, searching for what he wanted to say, the words to go with his feelings. 

"I'm glad I can help take care of him," Gabe said. 

"You don't like, owe him or—"

"No, it's not like that." Gabe opened his mouth, but the words took a moment to come. "I don't know. It's hard to explain. He's a good person who does good things, and we want to take care of good things, don't we?"

"That sounds really nice." Tyson cleared his throat. "Yeah, I like that."

"Good. You better."

Tyson laughed and settled back into the passenger seat, relaxing for the first time all day. 

*

At the end of February, the team had a weirdly long break between their last home game and their next road trip, so Gabe convinced Tyson, Nate, EJ and his wife to go camping.

"Oh, this is how we got Tyson out here," Nate said as they arrived at the four-bedroom ranch house just inside the national park. 

"Listen, if you're gonna take me away from Wi-Fi and cell service for three days, I better have a bed and a wine fridge," Tyson said. "Fuck, this shit's nice. Dibs on the master bedroom." 

"We got you into the woods, Tys, you can have anything you want," EJ said. 

"Am I really that spoiled?" 

Four faces looked back at him with politely blank expressions, so Tyson flipped them off and took his and Gabe's bags in search of the master bedroom.

Camping was the shit when EJ, Jackie, and Gabe packed lunches and wandered off to hike something and Tyson and Nate took Henry to the river nearby. It was unseasonably warm so while Nate pretended to know how to fish, Henry had almost as much luck snatching fish out of the water. Tyson set up his chair, put on his sunglasses, pulled out his book, and read with his beer until Nate called it and they headed back to the house to nap and think about dinner. 

The real attraction, the real reason Gabe had been able to get Tyson to come along at all, was the stargazing. The five of them would bundle up at night, grab a bunch of camping chairs, and set them up in the open field beside the house. They shared thermoses of the various warm drinks they had mixed and talked and watched the skies until it got too cold, retreating one-by-one until it was just Gabe and Tyson left outside. 

Tyson edged his chair closer, grabbing Gabe's arm and leaning against his shoulder.

"You miss it up there?" 

Gabe was quiet for a little bit. "Sometimes I miss the view I had," he finally said. "The grand scale of things, looking down on this place. It helps to remember that when I'm upset about something. _Remember, this will pass and they'll be dead in the blink of an eye_."

"Metal as fuck," Tyson laughed. 

"Not metal, just reasonable."

They were quiet for a while longer, but then Gabe nudged Tyson and stood up. "Hold on, come here," he said as he took Tyson's hand and pulled him several steps further from the house. "Look up and look... right there. That thick knot of stars, do you see that?"

"Yeah?"

"That's where I came from."

"What? Are you shitting me? How do you know that?"

"I've been looking," Gabe said. "And reorienting, and remembering, and—" Tyson looked at Gabe, at Gabe's face, his eyes so wide and clear as he stared at that spot in the sky. "I feel it. I know. And that very bright dot inside the edge of that cluster?"

"Gabe, there's so many bright dots—"

"That one's Bea. I know that."

No, Tyson couldn't tell which of the million dots over their heads, which of the hundred in that specific cluster Gabe was specifically talking about, even as he pointed it out to Tyson, but Tyson believed him. He squeezed Gabe's hand and Gabe squeezed back. 

"You tell her you're doing okay?" Tyson asked.

"She can see that. She knows."

They stayed out a few minutes longer, Tyson tucking his face against Gabe's shoulder and Gabe pulling Tyson in close. A cold breeze brushed against their cheeks, so they packed up their chairs and thermoses and headed back inside, their friends waiting for them so they could stay up and talk into the night. 

**Author's Note:**

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